


Time to Kill

by KKGlinka



Series: Time Flies [2]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Drama, F/F, Gen, Implied/Referenced Torture, One-sided - Relationship - Freeform, Politics, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Rape/Non-con Elements, Slavery, Talon!Tracer, talon au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-26
Updated: 2018-02-25
Packaged: 2018-09-12 06:57:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 36,172
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9060943
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KKGlinka/pseuds/KKGlinka
Summary: Following the events in Dubai and Lena Oxton's disclosure to her former team mates of Talon's true hold over her, those same employers have less time to make best use of their favorite human weapon, as she continues to test their true mastery, and they strive to find a better method.





	1. Chapter 1

Lena materialized and considered the target point marked on the plasticrete in front of her. She was about half a meter short of it, but not too far past her previous ten meter blink limit. She stood and waited for the doctor's assessment, from where he was shielded in his control room. There was nowhere to go, no way to escape from the underground training range, its gray walls and floodlights. She allowed her head to tip to one side in a show of impatience, rocking lightly on the struts of her legs, gazing blankly at the far wall in boredom.

"Would you care to explain your lack of effort?" Doctor Pirouz Azarkeyvan asked through the intercom, voice distorted by the echo of the vast chamber.

"I'm not the boffin here, sir," she drawled. "This is as far as I can go," she added in the same tone to further express her irritation.

"That's right," he agreed. "You aren't the engineer and I say my alterations functioned in testing. You should be able to make the eleven meter mark, possibly further. So, I will ask you again: why aren't you trying?"

"And I'm going to say again: I am," she answered just as testily, before adding after a calculated pause, "sir."

An oppressive silence fell, not a single sound transmitted through the underground bunker. There was no buzz from the lights, no electronic bleed from the speakers and no on else in the range with her. The smoothly fitted joints of her prosthesis didn't squeak or scrape, not even a faint hiss of sliding metal. Even the accelerator harness was silent as it remained on down-cycle, restricted to a single function by the doctor's override programming.

She listened to her pulse _shush_ , each controlled inhalation and measured exhalation.

"Very well. Testing is concluded. Prepare for disarmament."

Lena rolled her head, popping a couple of vertebrae and trying to ease the tension in her neck. Her current goals were difficult to stomach but absolutely necessary to endure.

"Tracer," Doctor Azarkeyvan snapped, in response to her apparent delay.

She flipped him off while making her way to the recessed doorway protected by a force field, then pivoted so that she faced away from it. Holding out her arms, she held still as possible as the two handlers removed her accelerator harness, before turning slowly and relaxing her posture. It took them forever.

When she had been younger, her racing thoughts had been deemed a dysfunction, a behavior that handicapped her social interactions. She talked too quickly, flitted about like a light-drunk moth, jumping from topic to conclusion before her peers had finished the first sentence. In later life, this mercurial nature would prove invaluable for piloting high-speed tactical crafts. She could think as fast as they could fly, as fast as she could fly without them now. It had been her savior in the Slipstream.

Her thoughts had already skipped past this formality, past the most likely punishment for her assumed obstinacy and insubordination, to the next part of the day. It had been three weeks since her last deployment. Surely it would be time for another, which would mean programming, followed by training. What would be for tea? Dinner, she mentally corrected, before dwelling on her next possible target.

One of the handlers, Fuhrmann, was smirking in anticipation, but Broz, the newest, remained dutifully impassive as the doctor approached.

Azarkeyvan met her eyes, thoughtful far more than angry, the calculating suspicion raising the hairs on the back of her neck. "I can't decide if your recent evasion of mission protocols has made you stubborn or plain arrogant, but your rash of misbehavior is unacceptable. You will not succeed in circumventing orders again. Picture drawings won't work a second time. Do you understand?"

"Yes, sir," she responded blandly.

"And you understand what I must do next?"

"Yes, sir," she repeated in the same tone, wishing he would get on with it.

He gave one of his aggrieved sighs, made a show of holding up his hand and tapped his fingers in the sequence for a Time Out.

Lena didn't resist the pull of the Slipstream as she had in the beginning, denying her captors the pleasure of watching her struggle in fear. Instead, she dropped into that unreality with an alacrity that she hoped resembled resignation. There was nothing to fear about being in her native element.

Her first time suffering incorporeal existence had been terrifying and confusing, moments in time flickering like split-second stills of an ancient film reel. There had seemed no respite from the relentless mental overload as she simultaneously lost all sense of physical self. But panic was a distant sensation without a heart to race, a body to sweat, or muscles to shake. 

There had been no motion, no sensation beyond the mental, and therefore no passage of time. As her mind settled into boredom, the flickering futures and past slowed with it. Fear turned into a concept that she turned around in her mind, picked at and examined as if it were a psychological rubix cube. The initial fear reduced to existential dread, increasing acceptance that no one was coming for her. Pilots died all the time but she wasn't thirteen percent nor eighty-seven; she had expected to remain in that limbo for all eternity, without a body to facilitate death. 

But she knew that Talon had sunk too much money into her not to bring her back would bring her back every time, for now. 

Initially, she concluded that she was a ghost or trapped in some hypothesized temporal dimension, but then she realized that she was witnessing alternate realities. It hadn't taken her long to realize she was conjuring every moment she witnessed with her own idle thoughts. Every scenario would materialize around her, as real as the one she had left, far too detailed and random to be pure concept. If she were trapped in some timestream, then she ought only see her own past and future, but there were so many versions of her life. Some, like her, were slaves to Talon. Some were volunteers, corrupted by lies or perceived betrayal as Gabriel Reyes had been. But others...

Lena became a voyeur of other Tracers who lived far happier lives. Some became vigilantes following the dismantling over Overwatch. Others never became pilots at all, choosing civilian lives, diverging further and further from her own choices. She even found far divergent universes full of supernatural creatures, earlier space travel and those that collapsed into primitive dystopias, realities that had diverged billions of years earlier. Within all of them, a pattern of friendships, lovers and enemies emerged, fractal patterns fragmenting only as realities diverged from her own.

The Slipstream wasn't time; it was a state of infinite possibility, which meant she wasn't a ghost. In the end, she fell back on her education in engineering and mathematics, along with the many discussions she had held with Doctor Winston prior to the final experiment. 

While her education in physics hadn't been nearly as advanced as Winston's, she had kept up conceptually during his animated explanations of his project. It was meant to be the culmination of decades of debate between scientists over the nature of quantum entanglement: did matter travel or did it disintegrate as an identical structure reformed elsewhere? And, did that matter? Even if the object being transported was a living human, did it make any difference if it were the original or a clone, so long as it believed itself the original?

Winston's experiments had begun with single particles, then solid matter, then complex objects, then mice, and finally graduated to bonobo chimpanzees. Those penultimate subjects had been chosen for their emotional and psychological complexity, to test for mental fidelity post teleport. He had proposed that travel, rather than molecular disintegration and reassembly, would be typified by a linear transition. When she had blinked at him, he rephrased, that she would recall the entire series of events.

She remembered Winston faltering with that admission, shuffling away and feigning some bit of work on his desk, before he continued with less vigor. The bonobos had materialized screaming in terror, so he had tentatively concluded that they recalled most or all of the experience.

Lena signed the waivers, passed the psychological exams for mental fitness, and updated her will. She understood the risks that came with piloting experimental crafts but wanted to be the first to teleport. Besides, she had no family or loved ones and knew it was probably one of the reasons she had been selected for the project. There would plenty more pilots in the world and she was ultimately one of London's leftovers.

If she existed in a state of being and not-being here, then the Slipstream was Schroedinger's proverbial box and she was the cat. But Winston had been wrong. There was an empty, yawning gap in her memories between the moment everything went blue and silent, as her body went dead, and a renewed awareness of being somewhere or something else. She wished she could tell him that the original Lena Oxton had died that day.

More than that, she shared thoughts and emotions with other Tracer's who happened to be blinking or recalling as she was. It was more pronounced if she was drifting in the Slipstream and she could follow minutes or even hours of another – usually – woman's life. She suspected another Tracer was doing the same to her when she felt her nape prickle and skin crawl, that sense of someone walking on her grave. Either way, a human being wasn't ever several people at the same time, an infinite deck of possible beings.

It had taken her a long time to identify thoughts and emotions that weren't her own. Here, Azarkeyvan had been angrier and started to thrash her. In another, he had given no warning. No, had she struck him first? Or, no, no...She didn't work for Talon; that was insane. She was being morbid. Probably hadn't had enough to sleep. That was it.

Lena gently reassured that Tracer in the jiffy it took for her to blink. 

Giving herself an immaterial moment to be pleased, she focused on her most recent data set and got back to work. She didn't have time to play, visiting versions of herself that fate treated more kindly with vicarious indulgence. Instead, she used the very same hypnotic strategies that her undesired employers used to fix mission objectives in her mind to isolate a specific point, in a specific time, along a specific decision tree: _13890-32.310-68_

As always, the process triggered bittersweet memories of mentally recording variables during a test flight. For a split second, she was there again, the fighter beginning to shudder as a line of smoke cropped up from the inner starboard engine: _00000-0.000-0_

No, she stopped herself. _13890-32.310-68_. She needed that other then and there and she needed to memorize as fast as possible.

And that time and reality spread out around her in ghostly form. 

She was jerked out of the Slipstream before she had reached her capacity to remember all the minute variations in the timeline she was analyzing, but she had achieved enough to be satisfied. Lurching forward as soon as the walls of the local Recall Chamber swam in her vision, she stumbled and dropped to all fours. She forced herself to hyperventilate, smiling grimly as her lungs countered her efforts, pushing respiration back down to normal. She needed to maintain the response Azarkeyvan was expecting, which was made easier by the hardware in her chest disguising the truth.

Crawling to the closest edge of the chamber, she fell onto her side, pulling her knees to her chest in a fetal position, and pressed her back against the non-conductive aluminum alloy wall. She thought of her most recent mission and it was enough to trigger convincing tears. She didn't need to feign trauma for too long before the chamber hatch hissed open.

Lena offered little assistance as Fuhrmann and Broz lifted her by the arms, then gradually found her footing until they left her standing in the main evaluation room. She kept her head down and shoulders bowed as if cowed into submission and shock.

Watching the doctor's brown loafers transcribe an arc around her, she listened to him mutter, caught the flickers of light as he entered data into a holo. She raised her head when he pushed a finger under her chin to peer into her eyes. Uneasily, she kept her gaze vacant. She had been faking this response for a while now, but Azarkeyvan wasn't stupid. He might suspect that she was exaggerating, but he also understood his own position at Talon. Despite his aptitude in bioengineering and advanced cybernetic prosthetic technology, he was Iranian and every administer and commander above him was lily white.

If push came to shove, he was even more disposable than her, because at least she had quantum physics on her side to sweeten the deal. He would be forced to shoulder the blame and quietly disappear as Talon disavowed his unauthorized, and ostensibly undocumented, work.

He grunted, shutting down the holo. "Since you seem stable, we may as well program you now." Azarkeyvan looked her in the eyes with a smile as bland as her tone had been. "A or B?"

She took a deep breath and sighed, without breaking her gaze. "A," she answered.

The corners of his lips twitched. Stepping away from the exit, he gestured at the two handlers. "You both know the way to lab eleven?"

"Yes, sir," Fuhrmann answered for both of them, before waving an electrified baton loosely in Lena's direction.

She headed out into the hallway, then veered uncertainly. Normally, she walked ahead of her handlers, but she didn't know where laboratory eleven was in this facility. It was far larger than most of Talon's bases, a central station with numerous, sprawling levels and out-buildings, and she wasn't permitted free reign.

Fuhrmann's lips flattened reprovingly, mistaking her source of hesitation, and she flinched into a bracing stance. Whatever he saw on her face, through the shield of his visor, belayed the motions of his left hand. "Left for two intersections, then right," he ordered.

Lena slowly dropped her shoulders, checking peripherally on Broz. The less experienced woman had a tight grip on her baton, the fingers of her left hand twitching into the first motions of a shock. Cautiously, Lena began forward as directed. She didn't feel like startling the new handler into an unwarranted reprimand.

She sighed again, as they resumed the march. A or B. The first was her willing cooperation with subliminal programming of her next mission objectives. The second was how her time in Talon had begun. It involved semi-starvation, sleep deprivation, just enough drugging to leave her mentally impaired, and being forced to listen to those orders on endless loop. The end result would be the same because self-will was a finite resource, something to do with neurotransmitter depletion. 

She might not have believed the doctor when he condescendingly explained it, but she remembered that tiny factoid from her initial officer training coursework with the Royal Air Force. The instructor from that class had warned them that, under long-term imprisonment, resistance needed to be applied tactically and without pride. There was no point in enduring days of exhaustion and misery, and she was curious to see if Trevor had the influence he claimed. But she doubted he knew that Talon had its own Slipstream project in pipeline.

"Stop," Fuhrmann ordered, before sliding open the double-doors beside them.

Her eyes took a moment to adapt to the deep blue lighting of the open plan lab, as she scanned for the reclining chair. It always reminded her of the cockpits of certain high-altitude crafts, albeit without the accompanying enclosure. Either it was a single custom-fitted model Talon dragged around with her, or they had multiples installed in every facility that contained a Recall Chamber. She reckoned it was the latter, swinging up into it without further prompting.

The chair grabbed her into place automatically, which would require an executive command from the doctor to release, but it was ridiculously comfortable. There were no pressure points. Nothing was too hot or too cold. She might as well have been suspended in a gel bath, and that was the whole point. No physical discomfort would distract her.

She was immersed in dead silence once the doors hissed shut, with the handlers departing. It was so muted that her ears fixed on the only available sounds: her own respiration, heart beat and random bits of gurgle somewhere in her gut. Those internal sounds could drive a person subjected to sensory deprivation mad and it was a relief when Azarkeyvan's voice broke in through the intercom.

"Programming sequence twenty-eight point zero one commencing."

The lighting dropped, the furthest edges of the room disappearing into blackness but the area in her immediate vicinity remained a the deep ultramarine that always made her imagine she was drowning. Unable to look down at herself and with no point of reference, she could only assume her vision swam along with the sensation of whatever had been just fed into her bloodstream. A shudder went through her body as everything tickled for a second. She could barely move, but she would also be unable to sleep, trapped in a state of restless insomnia.

Maybe she was underwater, even though she could breathe, because she caught flickers of motion in her peripheral vision. And that was definitely an angler fish in front of her, its monstrous, hollow eyes and needle fangs blotted out by the faint light it dangled. A talking angler fish, she decided, huffing in soft laughter. The imaginary things she couldn't quite see helped, but that light was the sole point of available focus, coupled with the murmur of orders on loop. 

Her eyes flicked to her sides, trying to catch sight of the ghostly flickers, then back to the light, away again. She sighed heavily just to hear something else, then switched to her own pulse. It held at a steady, resting sixty beats per minute by the pacemaker. Programming mode wouldn't allow her to become excited or aroused in any way – genuinely nothing to distract from her orders. Her gaze had tracked back to the light, but there were two who could play this game, more if she counted the new players she had recently added.

Though her wrists were locked down, her fingers were free and she curled those of her left hand as if she were holding a stick and began pressing her thumb against her index finger. If the techs noticed, they would attribute it to one of the many nervous tics she had developed over the past two years. If they asked, she would say that it was a front cannon reflex. But they were long presses mixed with short, imprinting her own orders with her pulse as a meter.

Her concentration was gone, head full of static, when she became aware that the light levels were increasing to an ultraviolet-backed, brilliant white. She squinted against the artificial daylight. It might keep her healthy and awake, but her eyes had always been light-sensitive. She took a deep, experimental breath and stretched out the fingers of her left hand from where they had cramped. Though she could never gauge it internally, these sessions usually lasted about two hours.

The main door hissed open and twin sets of footsteps heralded Fuhrmann and Broz, the handlers coming to either side of the chair and deftly releasing her. Broz stepped back hastily, as if expecting Lena to surge out of the chair in attack, and Lena caught Fuhrmann's dry glance of amusement.

Lena couldn't lunge up if she tried. Her muscles were alternately stiff and gelatinous, her movements to dismount weak and shaky. Whatever the doctor released into her bloodstream tended to linger and she stumbled, trying to follow the direction of Fuhrmann's baton.

"Fuck, you areshole, gimme a moment. Done this enough times," she wheezed.

Broz started, unaccustomed to hearing Lena speak unless addressed, but the other handler only snorted.

Lena wove in place for a minute, shuffling her feet to periodically catch her balance. She rubbed her eyes with the heel of one hand, yawning and wishing the god-awful light would quit. Broz flinched again and she ignored her. At this point, Fuhrmann might club his partner if she screwed up the programming routine. Would be nice to witness, actually.

The door slid open again to admit Doctor Azarkeyvan. "Alert?"

"Yes, sir."

"Repeat your orders back to me."

Lena fixed her gaze past his shoulder and droned out the entire mission objective, targets, times, positions, level of damage and restrictions. When her left hand began to twitch, she curled both into fists and twisted her expression into a matching grimace. In truth, she neither knew nor cared about the Swiss Minister of Customs and Imports, but it wouldn't do for her overlaid orders to slip out.

The doctor asked her to clarify several points before nodding in satisfaction, jotting out several notes and flicking his dismissal.

She mentally heaved a cautious sigh of relief, preparing to follow the handlers. It would either be back to her quarters or off to weapons practice. She tapped a finger contemplatively against the tough material of her training leggings, chiding herself for her disinterest in Talon's reasons for assassinating the minister. It had to be more than merely obstructing weapons imports.

"Schedule says weapons, hotshot," Fuhrmann informed her. "Back the way we came. Break time's over."

"Pity. Being hypnotized by a talking fish is the highlight of the month," she said, strolling forward on far steadier legs.

"What?"

Lena jerked her gaze to the right at the woman who was actually shorter than her. "Lordy, it talks!" Then, when Broz instinctively tensed her grip around her baton, "Calm your tits, lady. If I wanted to knock you around you'd be in medical already."

"Tracer," Fuhrmann warned quietly, tapping the back of her shoulder with inactive baton.

"Going," she answered in exasperation, raising her hands as if in surrender. 

"Is she always like-"

Lena turned her next step into a pivot, catching Fuhrmann's still outstretched arm and using his body to knock over Broz. Sliding into a fencer's lunge, she dropped her full weight onto his forearm, his elbow over her knee letting out a satisfying pop. 

"Two meter rule," she snarled into his face, before lurching away and falling over because Broz had regained her competence.

Lena rolled onto he back, jamming her elbows against the floor as her chest squeezed before she managed to slap a palm down.

"Enough," Fuhrmann ordered Broz from where he stood, clutching his injured arm.

Catching her breath around a mouthful of spittle, Lena had the satisfaction of seeing the pallor of his usually sepia skin, the sheen of sweat on his upper lip. She threw a mock salute. "Cheers." 

"Here you go, you fucked up dyke. Two meters," he motioned the distance between them with his chin. "But next time, I won't just tap you."

She chuckled mirthlessly.

"Up," he ordered, but two meters was too close to conceal Fuhrmann's groan of pain.

Lena rolled smoothly upright, almost smiling when Broz backed away hastily.

He nodded. "You know what? You don't want to work for the doctor? That's fine. You're gonna work for me." He gave her a grimace of a smile. "You're going for a Run."

_Bollocks_. The odds were always weighted in favor of a Time Out, but she had known the risk of an increased penalty if one had been meted out earlier in the day. She heard his grunt of amusement at her apparent dismay, but there was no point in fussing over it.

A few minutes later, she was standing on the infernal treadmill, where she would be run into exhaustion. Until she literally dropped and was thrown onto the electrified mat behind her. Finding out more about the Swiss Minister would need to wait. 


	2. Chapter 2

Lena woke groggily in a medical lab with no recollection of being removed from the mat, but almost immediate awareness that her lower legs were missing. It didn't matter that she was strapped down, preventing her from sitting up or raising her legs to test for missing weight. Without the prostheses, her motor cortex was absolutely convinced she had flesh and blood legs, that something was still there. Phantom sensations came from empty space and she kept trying to move her foot or calf in response, to shake away an itch or tingle, to try and feel the fabric and foam of the gurney underneath.

Numbing or destroying those nerves would render her prostheses dead weight. Their synthetic nerves transmitted signals through the biological ones, then to the established neural mapping of her motor cortex meant for her amputated originals. Trying to limit unwanted neural activity had, thus far, left her paralyzed enough each time that it triggered a panic attack. Nevertheless, she rarely needed to endure the maddening burn of semi-exposed nerves, the ache in her bones where the support rods were inserted into hollowed cavities. 

She was usually kept sedated for upgrades, but here she was, IV line snaking to her arm and a built-in bed pan. Which meant she had been here awhile. While Fuhrmann had taken his sweet, vengeful time disabling the electrified mat, she hadn't recalled breaking anything on the way down. She hadn't even hit her head, instinctively tucking before impact as much as her fatigued muscles had allowed. There would have been burns, but dermal injuries healed readily with a nano-boost.

Her fingers jittered on the surface of the gurney and she wished her hands were free so she could check her body for signs of surgery. The doctor, or one of his assistants, was rummaging about with equipment behind her, but there wasn't much point in craning her head around to spot whatever was coming next. She had no control over it. She wished he had left her unconscious but assumed there was a reason, aside from watching her squirm, to keeping her awake for the refitting. 

Doctor Azarkeyvan came into her field of vision, holding one of her legs like a trophy and she concealed a sigh, then narrowed her gaze. The leg sported a number of cosmetic differences and seemed to have a slightly different curvature along the blade. She grimaced reflexively at the exposed artificial nerves above its knee, undulating like tiny snakes around the support rod, as they searched for their ports. Those never stopped being gross and served as implicit reminders that she was technically a cyborg now. Maybe it was easier for Talon to justify their actions if they could say she was only a half step removed from an omnic. Even closer, if they decided to chip her.

Lena centered her gaze just past the doctor's shoulder.

"No good morning? Thank you for patching me up? You had second-degree burns on your back and arm, you know. Fuhrmann left you on the mat a bit too long. By accident, I'm sure."

"Bugger yourself," she said in greeting, with complete disinterest. 

"Is she always so rude?" a woman's voice asked.

Lena sucked in her breath, twisting her head awkwardly to see who it was. The voice was unfamiliar and, whoever the — Indian? Indonesian? — woman was, she had been wholly silent until now.

"I'm afraid so," Azarkeyvan answered. "I want to apologize in advance for whatever rudeness spills out of her mouth, but you did want her awake."

"Her language doesn't concern me as much as the neural mapping. Please proceed."

In full sight, the woman reminded Lena of Amélie in bearing, but without the latter's liquid grace. This woman moved with precise but almost mechanical control, and with no expression on her face beyond a laser focus in her dark eyes. Amélie was usually smiling the faintest bit, as if everything in the world was a source of bemusement.

Then Lena spotted the Vishkar logo craftily worked into the woman's well tailored, pale blue tunic. Her fingers stilled, the tips pressing into the thin foam mattress beneath her. Vishkar was — had been, apparently — Talon's only true competitor and source of global resistance. She was more familiar with Vishkar in that she knew what their security teams looked like when her pulse rounds ripped them to shreds but, from what she could tell, their goals were almost identical.

The two companies had been in corporate warfare for the past year, hacking databases and pillaging research laboratories, along with the usual economic maneuvering in which they destroyed each others shell companies. While innocent, hard-working citizens across the world suffered most of the resulting fallout, the competition between the two behemoths had slowed their respective progress in political dominance. But both were selling the same product to the public: prosperity through order. Perhaps it had been inevitable that their goals would dovetail.

Doctor Azarkeyvan was smiling, a devilish glint in his eyes as he observed Lena's wariness. "Now that I have your genuine attention..."

Lena swallowed, eyeing the new prosthetic more closely.

"As you doubtless surmised — because I know you're not as stupid as you act — this set comes courtesy of our newest allies and," he held her gaze, continuing pointedly, "we wouldn't want to disappoint their goodwill and generosity. I understand these were somewhat expensive to develop, so don't do anything stupid."

"Two point three million universal," the woman supplied. "I've examined her profile in detail and was under the impression your agent is relatively intelligent. Has her mental function been impaired in some way that is not recorded in the official documentation?" She turned her head smoothly, fixing that eagle gaze on the doctor.

"Oh no," he assured her in clipped tones, "she is quite clever. But insubordinate, deceptive and manipulative at every opportunity. Do not allow any insult she throws to distract you."

The woman tipped her head back slightly. "If she is an unmanageable asset–"

"We are managing her and an additional technique is available if it proves necessary. Commander Reyes has always proven an effective strategist and has already implemented measures to improve her tractability and performance. You needn't be concerned, ma'am. I'm only warning you not to be fooled by her vulgar behavior."

"Ah. I understand."

"Oi, luv, not to break up your nerd wank, but who are you? Got a name to go with that body?"

The woman cocked her head as if puzzled by the question. "She has a very strong accent."

The doctor sighed. "Proper English, Tracer, or I swear I will take a lancet and stab it into one of your ports."

"Sounds kinda dirty," she observed. "Pretty sure company policy covers you too."

The woman watched their interplay with the same flat expression with which she had started, before waving her left hand almost absently, creating a translucent stool out of thin air.

Lena lost interest in whatever the doctor might have said next, abruptly noticing that the woman's left arm was artificial and the light had come from it. Her eyes widened when the woman perched on her creation. While hard light mechanics was a facet of every day existence, witnessing a spontaneous construction was unnerving. Maybe she had certain objects programmed into the arm? 

"I'm sorry," the doctor said, clearly abashed. "I should have brought you a chair. Please forgive my oversight."

"There is no need," the woman said while keeping her attention on Lena, crossing her legs demurely, arms resting over her thigh. "What did you ask me a moment ago?"

"No one's introduced you," Lena restated. "Want to know which Vishkar goon came for a personal show'n'tell."

"That's perfectly reasonable," the woman agreed. "I am Director Satya Vaswani, a field resource assessor temporarily assigned as a liaison with your company. Despite certain conflicts of interest, we are quite impressed by your performance and it's a pleasure to make your acquaintance. We hope that this token of goodwill improves your functioning."

"Pretty speech for buying my service, Sats. Do they do tricks or sommat? Maybe got built-in snack machines? I can chew on some light cubes?"

"There's a thing called gratitude, Tracer," Azarkeyvan cut in.

"Oh, yes, thank you, master," Lena drawled obsequiously. "I'm so grateful to be strapped down like a rabid dog and treated like a treasured slave. It makes me feel so loved and valuable."

The doctor's face finally contorted with humiliated fury, but his consternation was directed at Vaswani, not Lena. "I am so sorry, Director–"

"I'm in this bed because I was run into exhaustion, then electrocuted until I burned so bad I blacked out," Lena cut him off bluntly.

"Because you tore Fuhrmann's elbow!"

"Because that pervert broke the rules. Again. Bad enough knowing he gets off to the peep show."

Vaswani actually developed a facial expression, pinning her attention to the doctor, before swinging her gaze to Lena. "What peep show?"

"They record everythin–"

"Silence," the doctor ordered.

Lena stopped mid-word and began studying the seam of the ceiling tile overhead. It looked like the fun had run out.

"Doctor," Vaswani prompted in the mildest command for information that Lena had ever heard.

Azarkeyvan bowed his head, eyes closed. Balancing an elbow on one hand, he pressed curled fingers against his forehead. After several controlled breaths, he opened his eyes. "She was attempting to undermine our alliance while in its most fragile state, Director."

"You were lying?" Vaswani directed at Lena.

Lena remained mute. It was easier to avoid speaking if her mind wasn't in full attendance, if she didn't pay attention to how this director and the doctor were discussing her like a piece of semi-sentient equipment.

"Why isn't she answering me?" Vaswani demanded, her tone becoming somewhat icy.

"Because the command I just gave her prevents her from breathing if she attempts to speak," he admitted reluctantly.

"Belay that command," Vaswani ordered, after a pause to digest that information.

"Ma'am, I would strongly advise–"

"Doctor, it is my job to ascertain all possible risks. Please do not interfere in my examination and observations," she warned him, ever so politely. 

Azarkeyvan grunted in disapproval but said, after a disgruntled pause, "Tracer, you're free to speak."

"Golly gee," Lena responded acidly. "And no, I wasn't lying. Not a single word. I was never good at it to begin with but I'm pretty sure the drugs they pump into me have permanently damaged my brain to mouth filter." She shrugged as much as the strap over her chest and upper arms would allow.

Vaswani's gaze went right back to the doctor and said, with barely detectable accusation, "You claimed that Talon's reformulation of Tetra 2 prevents neurological decline."

"At the time we made that claim, it appeared to be true. We've detected minor memory problems and behavioral changes that suggest very slight impairment, but these side effects are all manageable. Several minor dysfunctions always disappear after I administer a standard nano-boost, which leads me to believe they're products of head trauma or inflammation rather than neural deterioration." Azarkeyvan paused, tipping his head in acknowledgment. "At the end of the day Tetra remains Tetra and was never intended for long-term or permanent use because high-risk, strategic assets are invariably lost or destroyed."

"Very well," Vaswani said after a moment of consideration. "Your logic is...acceptable, but I will report this change in data to my superiors."

"Of course," Azarkeyvan responded genially. "But you might also wish to inform them that our engineering has had some recent break-throughs and we'll...no longer suffer from a resource shortage." 

"Are you exploring alternate methods of resource management?" Vaswani asked, an odd lilt to her voice and a raised eyebrow suggesting contempt. "I find it's best not to assume success before it has been achieved." 

"Believe it or not, Reyes has hired a mental health professional to monitor and evaluate her behavior and make suggestions for alternative methods of persuasion. Some of those recommendations are difficult to accommodate, but we have been making progress." 

Lena absently followed their continued discussion while keeping as still as possible, an easy task for someone who trained not to twitch a muscle while piloting deadly, high-speed, tactical crafts. Her fat mouth was mostly unrestrained temper, words being one of the few ways in which she was permitted to act out. Nor was she about to explain that her recent memory problems were the result of trying to monitor dozens of similar timelines. Then again, she had noticed lapses in her ability to concentrate, segments of unaccounted for time and similar bouts of amnesia. It could be the Slipstream, or plain old-fashioned PTSD related disassociation, but combat meds degraded working memory first.

She didn't want to think about fully cooperating with Talon to avoid becoming a vegetable, one way or the other, but she could feel the doctor's eyes boring into her in silent warning not to make a liar out of him.

"Tracer," Vaswani commanded, the call-sign startling Lena back to attention, "what is this two meter rule?"

"No personnel are permitted within striking distance, nominally set at two meters. Officially, it's a courtesy to me, but it's for their safety," Lena answered belatedly, counting the spider lines formed by the random texture of the ceiling titles. What did Azarkeyvan mean about recent advancements? Had they finally figured out how to source chronal energy without relying on her as a tap? 

She swept her eyes briefly over Vaswani's face but it remained closed, which she had decided was a natural rather than forced quality. There had been plenty of those sort amongst her fellow STEM majors, but most had been given the early tutoring and assistance necessary to reach more average social skill levels at relatively young ages. Lena herself had been a withdrawn child, far more interested in taking things apart to see how they worked, in between constructing elaborate, imaginary battle scenes in which ace pilot Oxton defeated a whole platoon of Bastion units. Perhaps the woman hadn't been given those opportunities in her culture; Lena knew Vishkar maintained a strict caste system. Even if she had been given social tutoring, some could only achieve so much and it was impolite to expect more. 

Vaswani was studying the polymer bands keeping Lena tied to the gurney. "Are you normally bound during treatment?"

"Eh, this?" Lena gestured awkwardly with her chin to the highest band over her chest. "Nah, not unless I'm still wild." Upon Vaswani cocking her head, she elaborated, "if my mission is a cock up and they extract me early. Happens sometimes. Usually because I'm severely injured or outnumbered 'cause their intel was rubbish." And because Reaper often overestimated her willingness to commit mass murder. Even under the influence, her temper burned out quickly, and she had never been the sort to hold a grudge, though she was learning how.

Vaswani leaned back slightly, abruptly shifting her focus to Azarkeyvan. "You may begin. I will be monitoring her neural activity," she stated, raising her left hand, a hard light construct beginning to form in the air above her palm as a shimmering blue visor materialized over her eyes. 

Doctor Azarkeyvan nodded before briskly picking up a cylinder of nutrient gel and dipping the connective end of one prosthetic leg into it. He removed it quickly, then shook it carefully to dislodge the excess, allowing the clear goo to drip back into its container. The synthetic nerves writhed like a tangle of worms exposed to sudden heat.

Lena wrinkled her nose at the sight, bracing more from instinct than real need, as the doctor brought the prosthetic over to her gurney.

"Now, Miss Vaswani tells me that you may experience some...unusual sensations, though that's rather the point of these," Azarkeyvan explained pleasantly, but gave Lena no time to comprehend before aligning the prosthetic below her left thigh port.

Having seen it before, Lena knew those wormy nerds straightened out as if pulled tight, seeking their biological mates, before she felt the jerk of the electromagnetic lock activating. The doctor simply released the prosthetic and it snapped flawlessly into place, her thigh muscles spasmed as the bone anchor set. Before she could release her usual breath of relief that the worse was over, she gagged on air and hurled herself into the gurney's restraints.

A distant part of her figured she was screaming because her ears were ringing, but maybe that was part of the raw buzz going through her entire body, the wicked throb of energy in her chest that usually only happened when she was boosting hard. She could make out Azarkeyvan's staccato voice, shouting perhaps.

"...reducing threshold. Motor signals paired and networking."

"Hngh," Lena managed in protest, her cheeks wet down to her ears and neck. She couldn't release her death-grip on the edges of the gurney. "Wha...what?"

"Parts of your brain, including the motor cortex, operate at slightly higher efficiency than average," Vaswani supplied. "My initial buffer estimate was insufficient. I apologize for your distress."

"Apologizing to me?" Lena stuttered out. "Hah."

After a terrified second, she flexed her knee fractionally, then gasped sharply. It broke into another grunt of...not pain. Of too much. Something different and too much. She twisted in her restraints, her whole body crawling with the unfamiliar sensation.

"Breathe," the doctor ordered quietly, his voice soothing. "Breathe through it. Give you neurons time to identify the new data."

Lena squeezed her eyes shut, turning her head to one side in case she vomited, trying to maintain even respiration She concentrated on breathing, on not resisting whatever neural hullabaloo was going on with the new leg, on staying calm. Her chest still pulsed with more energy, edging past the unremarkable, the rhythm as agitated as her heart rate. Whether real or psychosomatic, she imagined that chronal energy pulsed in her veins in time with her blood.

"Pairing at eighty-nine percent," Vaswani provided absently. "Should it be strobing like that?" Vaswani asked.

Azarkeyvan inhaled deeply and Lena heard the faint, wet noise of him licking his lips as he hesitated. "The anchor normally flickers in time with her heart rate, barely noticeable to most people," he hedged.

"Does that constitute a flicker?"

Lena gave into curiosity and opened her eyes, looking back up. Being the closest to her own anchor, she could make out a cyan glow pulsing clearly and rapidly even under the glare of the medical lighting. Her head was full of cotton and her hands were shaking as she started to smile, testing the strength of her restraints.

"Oh no you don't," the doctor declared preemptively.

"Pardon–" began Vaswani.

"In a moment," he said, cutting her off. "It's what I warned you about."

Vaswani made a noise of understanding. 

Lena whined in disappointment as her head cleared and nerves stopped jangling. The overloaded ache in the new leg returned, setting her teeth on edge. Mind fully present, she gingerly tested the prosthesis again, pressing the mock heel into the hard gurney. She sucked in air between her teeth, staring vacantly in astonishment.

"What do you feel?" Vaswani asked clinically.

"I...holy fuckballs," Lena whispered. "The gurney. It's cold and hard. Metal. I know it's metal. It..." She dragged her heel as much as the thigh band would allow, experiencing the tackiness of the heel pad clinging to the low friction surface. "Cor..."

Instinctively, she tried to raise up and see what her body insisted was true. After all, her nervous system made similar claims about legs that were mostly gone. She only succeeded in jamming her anchor into the chest restraint, the press sending an uncomfortable twist through her entire chest and back to her spine.

Azarkeyvan picked up the second prosthetic leg and Lena crawled her fingers out to grip tightly at the edge of the gurney as he prepared it.

"The second will be less stressful," Vaswani said flatly, but the fact that she had noticed and responded to Lena's trepidation was, in its own way, considerate.

Nevertheless, Lena jammed the back of her head against the measly excuse for a pillow, overwhelmed by raw sensation. It wasn't quite pain, but too much of something again, as if her skin had been scalded or scraped by sand paper. Her vision clouded in spots of white as the incorporeal energy in her chest seemed to squeeze like a fist.

It was over faster this time and she realized that the spots in her vision were caused by the glare of Vaswani's visor. For a few seconds, as Lena caught her breath, the woman's eyes studied her contemplatively. 

"Check the second leg," Vaswani ordered, leaning away.

Lena did as ordered, able to describe the new sensations more accurately this time. The new prostheses would never replace the feel of her original legs and feet, but these Vishkar models were more than the near dead weight of Talon's. Given that the former company specialized in medical grade prosthetic replacements while the latter favored military grade, it wasn't a real surprise.

She chewed her lip as Vaswani and Azarkeyvan conferred across the laboratory, fidgeting in her bindings. Twisting one leg at the hip, she maneuvered one prosthesis to kick lightly at what she judged was the shin of the other. Her entire body jerked slightly when the tap resulted in an electric tingle of unrecorded sensation. It wasn't quite...she closed her eyes, concentrating.

Only the barest rustle of fabric alerted her that Vaswani had come closer, followed a moment later by the click of Azarkeyvan's loafers on the alloy floor.

"It should be similar to skin contact," suggested Vaswani.

"It's...I think...I can't tell," Lena admitted. "Not by using the other one like that. Too much of the same feeling from both? I think it's duller in the foot — I guess 'cause of the pad."

Vaswani hummed thoughtfully, gesture-writing with her artificial hand. Her loose, black hair slid over her shoulder as she turned to regard Lena's prostheses. From her position, Lena could only see the woman's shoulder lift before she felt...a hand wrapped around her calf?

"Can you feel my hand?"

Lena tried to speak but a choked noise came out instead. She coughed, flushing in surprise more than anything else. Her affirmative, when she tried again, still came out in an awkward croak.

"Tracer?" the doctor prompted.

"I, yes. I can feel all of your, um fingers, warm, soft. You're wearing a ring?"

"Where are you perceiving the contact exactly?"

"Upper calf, to the inside."

Vaswani smiled fleetingly and the sensations vanished as she stepped away from the gurney. "Tell me, Tracer, if the doctor were to release you right now, would you attack either of us? Would you attempt to escape?"

"Lady, I doubt I could even stand on these and where the hell would I go? We're somewhere underground; I'm surrounded by tossers who can drop me like a stone and even if I did make it out. How would I live? Talon's made sure..." She pressed her lips tight for a second. "I would be putting people at risk." 

Vaswani was cocking her head again, reminding her of an owl or some other raptor regarding a distant target. "You did not answer my question."

Lena felt her lips twitch in a stillborn smile. "I won't attack you."

"Very well. Doctor, if you would please release her?"

"Ma'am, I must object to this course..."

Vaswani managed to stand straighter, raising her chin a fraction, without breaking eye contact.

The doctor met her gaze without flinching and reached into his lab coat pocket. "Before this goes any further, I thought you might like these back," he said, tossing her a small, plastic bag.

Catching it deftly with her left hand, Vaswani flattened the bag and its contents on her palm. After a moment, she let out a soft snort, the corners of her lips creasing into a smile. "For the record, Doctor, I strongly advised my superiors not to install tracking beacons. I warned them that the wasted effort would be an insult to your intelligence." 

"I'll take your word for it," he said, but his response was decidedly noncommittal. 

Azarkeyvan went to the gurney's control panel, punching his fingers against the flat touch screen. After the restraints withdrew, he freed Lena from the medical equipment, roughly enough that she yelped in protest.

When he glared at her, she glared right back. "You wanna handle me when I'm naked, you put me right back under, 'cause so help me–" She would have continued her threat except an firm, alloy hand closed over the doctor's shoulder, pulling him smoothly away from the gurney.

"Please do not instigate an altercation, doctor," Vaswani reprimanded. "Is there clothing available?"

"Third drawer down to the left, over there," Lena answered while pointing, before he could get a word out.

"Trevor, Broz, get in here," Azarkeyvan ordered through his head-set, while heading toward the uniform storage area. He grabbed a tagged, plastic wrapped bundle that was always kept ready for Lena, given how often she wound up in the infirmary.

The two handlers burst into the room just as Lena carefully swung her legs over the side of the gurney, blinking away spots as she sat up. The IV drip wasn't generous with the calories and her mouth was dry, joints stiff from lying in one position so long. Despite those immediate discomforts, she heard the crackle coming from their drawn batons and hastily began to twist back onto the gurney.

"There is no cause for concern," Vaswani said, with such surety and command that both handlers dropped to a walk, then stopped to regard the scene in confusion. She clasped her hands behind her back, as if she found their presence unremarkable, but Lena spotted a spark of white-blue energy dancing along her fingertips. "I believe the doctor is merely irritated with Tracer but," she turned her head to regard the subject and added coolly, "that seems to be a routine state of affairs in your organization."

Lena raised her eyebrows and, deciding that Vaswani had everything under control, and swung her legs back over. Then she raised one back up, fingering the raised contours of red hard-light construct shielding the running blade. The muscles in her thigh immediately contracted from the shock of sensation and she gasped, jerking her hand back. She rubbed her thumb and fingers together, biting her lip, vaguely aware that someone was holding a bundle of black and gray clothing in front of her.

"Tracer," Vaswani prompted.

"Right, right," Lena responded, shifting her focus and taking the bundle, quickly separating out a shirt.

Wrangling the form-fitting fabric in place around her arms and lip of the cutout over the anchor, she grabbed the briefs and paused to consider. She could be ridiculous or she could try and step into them. Perhaps she should have expected it by this point, but it was a pleasant surprise when Vaswani supported her weight with a hand under her elbow. It turned out to be excellent foresight because Lena wobbled and then almost bounced back up onto the gurney in reflex.

"Fuck, that's cold!"

Humming to herself, Vaswani's gaze focused on the read-outs of the optical projector mounted over her eyes. Her prosthetic hand moved as if she were conducting music before she said, "Try again."

Dropping gingerly to the floor a second time, Lena shivered, but was able to stand. Her feet no longer felt bare, but as if she were wearing thin slippers...and walking on the balls of her feet. It was going to take some getting used to — a given — but she needed to focus on dressing. She shuddered several times as the fabric of the trousers tickled against the hard-light and had to resist the urge to scratch.

"There will be excess sensitivity as your brain readjusts to renewed sensory input, and not all of it will be entirely identical to what you lost. If it does not pass within forty-eight hours, inform the doctor and I will return to tune the buffering." She glanced at Trevor, completely bypassing Azarkeyvan. "Please lead us to the nearest combat course. I wish to evaluate her full range of function."

Lena heaved a quiet sigh and raked a hand through her greasy hair. She would have preferred a shower before dressing, a chance to become more familiar with the new legs, and a spot of tea. Running her tongue over grimy teeth, she added toothpaste to the growing list of basic decencies. 

"Have a nice day," Azarkeyvan said behind their backs as they departed.

Without looking back, Vaswani answered, "I always do."

Lena waited until the doors slid shut before snorting in amusement. "I know Vishkar wants to use me as bad as Talon, but I already like you better'n this lot."

"We don't want to use you so much as avoid seeing anymore footage of you and a Talon platoon storming one of our research facilities, but Vishkar would be pleased to offer you a place amongst our combat division."

"Lady, if it were that easy..." Lena muttered, noting with dampened amusement that Vaswani was keeping precisely two meters between them. 

She swept the two handlers with her peripheral vision. While she wasn't overly concerned by Trevor, she expected Broz to be twitchy. Instead, the slight woman seemed relaxed, her shoulders loose and baton collapsed on her belt. Had Trevor talked to her?

"I have a question for you, Ms. Oxton," Vaswani said. "Or, I suppose it is more of a cautious observation, but I have the distinct impression that your employment with Talon is either involuntary or occurred under duress." She hastily held up a palm. "You need not reply if it would require fabrication."

"My contract is indefinite, so there's no point in head-hunting," Lena reasserted, evading the implied question.

"Odd. That violates article 183.2 of the Hesef Accord, which determined indefinite contracts to be a form of slavery. When I reviewed your employee profile, I noticed you signed the contract the same day Talon allegedly retrieved you from the Slipstream. Given that your military records indicate that you are meticulous, precise and capable of rapid, strategic maneuvers, I would have expected you to give such a contract greater consideration."

"Welp, you said it yourself: quick thinking. Was flying by the seat of my pants," she amended, "if I'm being sorta honest." 

Vaswani came to a halt, turning to face her, expression scrutinizing and tone pointed. "Your former commanders repeatedly described you as a model officer, but I have yet to see one. As I said: odd. "

Lena ground her teeth, pulling her gaze away through force of will. She didn't know this woman, but Talon and Vishkar had been engaged in a deadly waltz since the former had begun its bid to infiltrate every possible country. If she violated the confidentiality agreement, she would be in for it.

"What's done is done," Lena gritted out, signaling an end to the line of questioning. "Look, any of you bother bringing me a bottle of water? Maybe a snack? Or is this gon' be one of those games where I keep going until I pass out? Seems kind of repetitive but... " She held up her hands in a mock shrug of acceptance while pivoting to face Trevor and Broz.

Rather than raise batons, the two handlers faced each other, somehow communicating despite the visors concealing their eyes.

Lena shifted uneasily, eyes on their left hands, then flinched into an aborted crouch when both reached around their belts. Grimacing, she widened her stance, bending her knees to help control the angle of descent when she fell.

Trevor swung out a water bottle and Broz presented something shaped like a ration bar, but wrapped in colorful plastic.

It took Lena a moment to unclench her jaw and slowly rise up, licking at her lips with the tip of her tongue. Kindness was always quid pro quo with the handlers. Often as not, it amounted to sexual harassment or demands for self-abasement to serve as amusement. She was about to balk when the flicker of blue cloth in her peripheral vision reminded her that she was on another master's schedule. Snatching at the proffered items, she unscrewed the bottle and resumed walking.

She snuck a sidewise glance up at Vaswani, but the woman seemed unperturbed by the delay. Based on what Lena had observed so far though, she was probably memorizing every single detail about the new, joint asset's behavior. Lena reckoned that her report wouldn't contain the words 'model officer'. Holding the half empty bottle against her ribs by using the crook of her elbow, she examined the bar, only to discover that it was candy, not granola or revolting pressed paste. She had to stop herself from head-checking Broz because, while Lena could believe that Trevor might have planned ahead in professional consideration, Broz must have given up her own snack. 

Quickly, she resumed the march toward the underground arena. She would learn soon enough what Broz expected in exchange.

They were met there by Project Manager Rebecca Poindexter, all professional elegance in her pencil skirt suit, with sandy-blond hair piled into a loose bun. Her affable greeting might have fooled Vaswani, but Lena knew Poindexter well enough that the woman's veiled contempt over working with someone distastefully brown, but in a position of power, was plain. Then again, Lena noticed that Vaswani tracked Poindexter closely as the woman briefly glanced at Trevor with vague tolerance and ignored Broz completely. Perhaps her snubs might wind up duly reported to Vishkar along with everything else. One could hope.

Poindexter jerked her chin toward Alberda, who was standing beside a small cart bearing the accelerator harness, vambrace holsters with mounted pistols, and goggles. 

Lena automatically stepped forward and held out her arms, giving her the minor satisfaction of seeing Poindexter flinch and almost step away, though the woman restrained the impulse. She smirked when Vaswani looked askance with narrowed eyes.

Alberda murmured a barely audible reprimand close to Lena's ear as she handed off the accelerator to Trevor and Broz, before going to stand with the perimeter guards. Those were atypical, probably meant to be a reassuring display of control for Vaswani which, by Lena's growing estimate, might have the opposite effect.

Lena rolled her shoulders to settle the harness, her entire body stiff and joints tight from laying too still for too long, but the commanding officer whistled her over to the course. Tentatively, she tipped forward into a jog, expecting a stumble or misstep, but the prostheses worked as intended. Her thigh muscles, on the other hand, twinged in protest. If those fools didn't let her stretch, this demonstration would be over the first time she needed to hurdle something. Which looked to be about twenty meters down — a parked SUV.

She waited as everyone living left the arena, her handlers outside to remain by the main doors, everyone else heading up to the observation and control room. Though she had already spotted several of the omnic training bots, she wasn't surprised to see several more filter onto the field. Others would be completely concealed and that pile of rubble about forty meters in looked like it might be a camouflaged Bastion unit. 

Just as she was resigning herself to a spectacular fubar, the commander ordered her to take five minutes prep and she promptly began a series of stretches and truncated warm-up.

* * *

Broz halted outside the door, but Trevor followed Lena into her quarters. Having grown accustomed to that, Lena swiped at some unruly bangs, slicking them back into her sweaty mat of hair. Her eyes promptly sought out her chronometer, widening when she realized it had been thirty-seven hours since she had initially lost consciousness. Pulling at the high collar of her compression shirt, she glanced impatiently at Trevor when he shut the door.

"What do you want now?" she demanded churlishly. "I did everything you guys wanted. A bit dodgy a few times, but it's not like anyone gave me time to get used to these."

In truth, she had done far worse than Vaswani or Poindexter probably realized, using recalls to correct for stumbles, hard landings and a badly flubbed triple dismount. It turned out that a broken hip bloody hurt. Who knew? 

Trevor crooked a smile.

"What?" she snapped, because even though he had never taken any liberties, Markovic's similar smile flashed in her memory. "I gab too much with the ice queen?"

"Relax, Oxton. You didn't do anything wrong, but you might want to sit down."

She froze instead, before lowering her head like a bull about to charge.

He raised his hands in supplication. "I'm not going to hurt you but, as a courtesy, there's something you need to know about your command programming update."

In one sentence, she felt her blood replaced by ice water and backed away to sit on the edge of the bed. Averting her eyes, she worked her jaw, swallowing and cupped her hands together loosely. Implanted in the base of her brain, a processor chip coordinated the mental commands she used with the accelerator, the function of her lungs, the pacemaker's output, and translated a limited set of verbal commands permitted by assigned users into penalties. Well, that explained being kept under for such a long time. 

"What is it this time?" she asked wanly.

"Ready?"

"Just do it," she mumbled, studying a discolored path along her knuckles that would become a bruise.

"Good job," he said.

Bracing for some type of pain, she was completely unprepared for the way her vision swam and muscles went slack with relaxation. She slid right off the bed, trying to catch onto the mattress, but tipped to the side to land sitting on her hip.

Her lungs forced her to suck in a deep breath, followed by a few more, to her continuing surprise. Her first coherent thought, as she leaned against the side of the bed, was drugs. But she didn't recognize this combination of side-effects and, now that her scrambled thoughts were back in order, didn't notice any mental fog or detachment. She simply felt good. It felt...

She raised the back of her forearm to cover her mouth, reflexively trying to shield her face as the previous ice water evaporated into flaming embarrassment. "That sick, soddin' bastard," she whispered in horror, hearing Trevor take a bracing breath of his own.

He didn't leave.

Though she turned back in his direction as she climbed back up, she kept her eyes trained on his boots. After taking almost a minute to regain her composure, she rubbed her hands over her face and spoke through steepled fingers. "How many of you know that command?"

Trevor shifted his stance, fidgeting a bit. "Uh. So. That worked then?"

Elbows on her knees, she wrapped her hands around the back of her neck. "I want to know how many–"

"I'm sorry, but I need to know if–"

"Yes, all right? You got me off with two bloody words. Fucking fantastic. Congratulations. I can already see how you lot are gonna use this trick," she snarled, jamming her fingertips into the divets of flesh over vertebrae. If only she could claw that chip out with her bare hands.

"All of us, the doctor and, I'm guessing, Reaper." 

She couldn't decide which was worse: knowing that her handlers would inevitably use this function to humiliate her in public, or the way all tension and anxiety had bled away without any need for addictive medication. She was grateful for the swamping anger. 

Finally, she looked up at his visored face. "Is that all? Because I need a shower and some grub."

He hesitated, which she decided was a very bad sign coming from this particular handler. Out of all of them, he was the calmest and most direct, which she assumed was a product of his professional training in mental health.

She shrank in on herself as her stomach clenched, wrapping her fingers into the sheet. "Should I, uh, scoot all the way up this time?" she asked, haltingly.

"It might be best," he agreed diffidently, while backing all the way into the abbreviated foyer of the door. "I know you dislike being touched and doing so now would make you even more uncomfortable." He started to raise his visor, a common gesture of politeness from him, but faltered. 

Lena had used the time to climb fully onto the bed, irritated by the smear of soot that now streaking the top sheet, as well as the sweat that would probably permeate it. It was best to focus on that and how she would eventually strangle Azarkeyvan with her bare hands.

"I'm sorry," he added.

She swallowed as he turned so that his shoulder faced her, using his right hand to tap a more complicated sequence into his wrist actuator.

The way everything in her core clenched up and start of a tremor had her whispering a horrified objection before her body bowed , fingers grasping at air as her chest froze mid-breath. In the next moment, she was sucking in a lungful of air, heart hammering in her chest, stuttering a moan on the exhale. Her body gave another involuntary shudder as she worked to catch her breath, and she pressed the heel of her right hand a fraction above and to the left of her anchor. Her heart was hammering fit to fly out of her chest.

"Too fast," she wheezed, jamming the other hand against the mattress, writhing against a very different pressure.

Trevor swore quietly.

Between the pacemaker and the counteractive, her heart slowed and the burst of combat fog abated. Lena dropped back bonelessly, working her jaw, lips dry from breathing through her mouth. She wet them, swallowing, but when she tried to sit up, her body refused to cooperate.

"Okay now?"

"Marvy," she whispered, watching clouds drift across the simulated sky. Apparently, it was daytime. "But he should dial that down." 

"Obviously. You're...not moving," he added dubiously.

"Normal," she explained. That one cloud really looked like an elephant.

"Right," he said, adding lamely, "I've never watched the vids so I didn't..." Giving a _tsk_ of consternation, he continued, "Nevermind. I'll assume you're wondering so, only I and the doctor know this one."

"Great," she mumbled, the fingers of one hand beginning to jitter.

"You're done for the day," he added. "It's off schedule, but I'll check with the nearest galley. There's probably something prepped in the cooler, if you're hungry?"

"Starving," she admitted. "I'm not calling in the morning, though."

It took him a moment, but he responded with a startled huff of laughter. "I'll nip over then. See you in thirty." 

Once she heard him depart and the door slide back shut, she pushed herself upright and leaned back on braced arms, indulging in a string of curses. After she finished damning Azarkeyvan into an early grave, she held her breath and exhaled slowly. Swallowing the bile lodged in her throat, she told herself it was better than condemning random women to death. Anger wouldn't change the latest ploy to win her compliance, but maybe it was time to start failing a bit during practice to avoid being praised like a clever dog. 

It was best not to think about it, so Lena switched her attention to the new prostheses. Solemnly laying her palm flat over one calf, she smoothed her hand up along the hard-light surface until she reached the mechanized knee. The muscles in her thigh twitched involuntarily and she shuddered. They would never replace what the doctor had callously amputated but...

She closed her eyes, trying to prevent it, but wound up knuckling away tears from her cheeks. Why now?


	3. Chapter 3

The sky over Bern was bleeding from ice blue to the first warm glow of dawn as Lena waited at her assigned position — a narrow alley between a closed upholstery tailor, and a nail salon. Talon normally deployed her at night, where her predominantly black uniform blended with the darkness, punctuated by warning red. She stood out like a blot of ink in broad daylight, but in the haze of pink and orange and the long, blue shadows of the brisk morning, she might have been invisible. 

She shifted her weight to the other leg, grateful that her prostheses were incapable of aching, but going numb with boredom. Birds had been singing for about an hour, waking with shrill anticipation at false dawn, but some of their melodies changed with the growing light. A small falcon swept under some eaves and she could hear rodents scuffling in the refuse around the dumpster behind her. Every now and then, a cyclist zipped past, and at one point, an omnic walked by with its equally oblivious dog. 

She started, wrists flicking twin pistols into her hands, when something brushed against her legs. Looking down, she discovered that the soft tickle and nudging warmth was a stray tabby demanding attention from a potential food source. Her lips twitched and she released the pistols, allowing them to snap back into the vambrace holsters. 

Her orders were to remain exactly here, stay alert and eliminate accidental witnesses before her primary objective arrived, but her HUD offered no protest as she crouched. Which meant there was nothing that forbade her from stroking the skinny animal, its vertebrae prominent underneath the orange fur. Her fingers bumped over ribs, but the cat began purring at an impressive volume, its chest vibrating from the effort. Raising her eyes back to a distant intersection, she wished she had more to offer than a moment of comfort. 

There was an irregular rustle in the alley and she whipped her head and shoulders around, a pistol pivoting into her left hand while her right continued to scratch at the tabby's ears. 

Someone let out a heavy sigh before the rustling increased. 

"No use hide now, eh?" a man asked rhetorically in heavily accented English, from behind the dumpster, coming into view as he finished speaking. 

Lena slid her index finger along the trigger guard, considering the hapless witness. She had wondered about the possibility of someone homeless using the alley to sleep, but her handler had given rigid orders to assume and maintain her current position. While human nations might have respected Switzerland's ostensible neutrality, the omnics hadn't given a damn, running roughshod over the country and leaving its infrastructure in tatters. No industrialized region had been spared during the Crisis. 

There was also the possibility that this wasn't a random homeless man at all. Though her given orders carried the implicit threat of repercussions should she twist her interpretation of them, she wasn't compelled to obey programmed instructions when not impaired by dope. 

Scanning him through the HUD of her goggles, she checked for weapons but only spotted a small pocket knife, before replying, "'fraid not, mate. How about you take a seat." 

"Seat?" he repeated querulously, scratching at him chin through several day's growth of beard. "Sit?" he guessed, after a pause. 

"Yes. Ja. Sit," she confirmed, motioning toward the cobblestones with the pistol's muzzle. Her German was virtually non-existent, but charades were universal. 

He haltingly lowered his emaciated frame down to the ground, using his hand to manipulate a stubborn prosthetic leg. It was an older model, little more than a hydraulic peg with an arched paddle for a foot. His clothing was serviceable, colors faded to puce and gray, telling her nothing about him. Pushing his head back against the dumpster, he sighed again before studying her as closely as she watched him. 

Lena shuffled partly around, loathe to stop petting the cat as it stropped about her legs and knees, occasionally nibbling at her fingers in reciprocation. "You coulda stayed quiet. Now I gotta kill you." 

After a few seconds to parse her statements, he snorted in derision. "News say you crazy," he said, emphasizing by twirling a finger around his ear. "Monster. Killer. But not shoot me and touch–" He broke off, then corrected himself. "And pet cat. Not good killer," he finished, shaking his head and chuckling. 

Given her lack of desire to be one, she didn't contest that point, but explained again, "Will kill you." 

"Ja, ja," he murmured in agreement, but waved a hand dismissively. "All die. Not scared." He tapped his chest. "Tired. Fight two wars. Fight hard. We win but," he gestured toward the street, "lose. They throw away soldiers." Nodding, he smiled. "Not scared. No more." 

Lena took a bracing breath. "I'm sorry." 

Less than a minute later, she stood and watched the street, the cat having bolted when her pistol discharged a single time. The sun had climbed high enough that warm pink lit up the brickwork to her left and the shadow nominally concealing her began to angle inward. If the motorcade didn't arrive in the square soon, she would have no choice except to move. 

Light glared off a windshield of a vehicle coming up over the blind hill at her ten o'clock, though her HUD immediately counteracted the scatter and presented her with the red outline of an armored car. Within seconds, the red switched to the yellow of a secondary target. If they were in a relatively standard formation, the second or third vehicle would be her primary, so she swung her gaze to the fountain ahead. Once she had the green, her implants would kick in and she didn't want to stand here in a twitching, impatient frenzy. 

Instead, she listened for the increase in engine noise and the flock of pigeons milling about the fountain in search of food scraps. When they took flight, she raised her head and her HUD pinged the center vehicle in green. Within seconds, she sucked in air to accommodate her accelerated heart, swaying as her vision swam, everything brighter even through the goggles. She gagged on the fetid odor of warming garbage and human waste, bolting out of the alley with a sound of disgust. 

But the drivers of the guarding vehicles were quick off the mark too — likely omnics — and a barely visible forcefield shimmered up between her and the objective. The leading vehicle swerved perpendicular to the second, adding a physical defense, while the final one banked in toward the center of the square, providing room for her target's retreat. 

Growling, she didn't waste time or energy shooting at it. Popping loose a pulse bomb, she blinked forward, spinning to slide flat underneath the blocking air car. Even before the bomb connected to its undercarriage, she was darting around to put the forcefield between her and it. Which brought her face first with cannons emerging from the hood of the third car. 

She bounded up the hood before they could fire and shot down at the window. When it deflected the pulse rounds cleanly, she tried a few rounds of hard ammo, but it bounced too. Switching back to the renewable pulse rounds, ultimately powered by her accelerator, she concentrated fire on the roof as the driver tried to shake her. It would have worked on an unaugmented person with normal feet, but she magnetically locked one in place, and rammed the other down onto the heat-softened metal as an explosion took the first vehicle. 

Shrapnel sparked loudly against the forcefield behind her and a piece of fusion exhaust tumbled past them to land on the asphalt. Grinning, she dropped her second pulse bomb into the hole her foot left behind, and blinked free of the car to land atop her primary target. Flopping onto her belly with a clang, she leaned over the windshield and waved cheerily at the driver. This one would need to be more careful with its occupant. 

Hopping back onto her feet, she repeated the roof trick until she had a hole big enough to insert her pistol and fired blindly. Several successful strikes to her hand necessitated recalls, but it was soon quiet and still inside the cab. Dropping to one knee, she listened for sounds of breathing, but received nothing but static and a noseful of burnt meat. She poked her head in far enough to scan the interior, allowing the HUD to isolate the internal lock bars that kept the heavy, armored doors shut. Aiming at the nearest — a passenger door — she melted it open. 

_Confirm Target Elimination_ , her HUD warned via a stark, text overlay. 

"Fucking backseat driver," she muttered, with a flare of irritation. 

What did the idiot program think she was doing? She withdrew her weapon, flopped onto her belly, rested her chin on crossed her arms and admired the view around her. 

_Confirm Target Elimination._

"I'll confirm it when you shut it." 

Her accelerator gave a soft warning beep, amplified by her comm unit, and every muscle in her body bunched in anticipation. Shaking in fear, in anger, she flung herself off the roof and savagely pulled open the door. When it tried to rebound, she kicked it, and when it started to swing back a second time, shot it off its hinges. Without checking for opponents, she ducked into the cab with pistols raised. As soon as she saw green, she sprayed pulse rounds until the outline turned red. 

Lowering them, she breathed through her mouth, listening. The beeps had stopped; there would be no reprimand. 

Yellow. 

She jerked her pistols back up to fix on an omnic huddled beside the remains of a woman's body. She considered. Yellow meant she had a choice, and she cocked her head with a grin. "Out. Sit. Hands behind your head." 

The omnic disembarked with alacrity. Though it didn't stumble or fumble the way a human would have, it was obviously moving hastily and sat cross-legged as instructed by the time she followed it out. 

She clapped her hands together. "Oh, you're good at following orders! I like that!" Leaning over as if conspiring to a friend, she added in a sotto whisper, "Confession: I hate following orders. Ironic, I know!" Waggling a pistol at it, she finished, "Don't move or I'll kill you for funsies." 

Climbing out onto the hood of the limo, she took a wide-legged stance, scanning her surroundings. Her HUD caught nothing living; not even the birds had braved out the violent confrontation. No one suddenly emerged from either wrecked escort vehicle, waving trails of steam and smoke rising from both. People didn't come pouring unwisely out of their homes, though some nearby windows slammed shut. She heard the hiss of damaged hydraulics from the engine block, a disjointed hum from a damaged hover-wheel, and the plaza fountain. The usual combination of ozone, burnt flesh and offal wafted around her and turned to consider the omnic aide. 

It shrank back, seven green eyes blinking chaotically, growing still as a statue on the ground. 

Her forearms twitched, but the omnic's outline remained yellow, so she turned back to her perusal of the city block, warm dawn light casting long, slate shadows. But even on the promised lower dosage, her heart continued to hammer in her chest and she fidgeted restlessly, unable to keep still while her implants kept her hyper-alert and primed for battle. Her handler in the drop ship hadn't given the all clear command and instinct had her lips peeled back in wariness. The fish had told her that there would be more to this mission. 

She wasn't surprised when her left leg snapped out from under her and she was flung from the hood onto the cobblestones. The rush of wet heat on her thigh told her the bullet had maimed flesh, the jarring reverberation that traveled up through her hip saying that it struck the internal mount as well. The fortified bone containing the rod was doubtless shattered. 

Tracer recalled and immediately blinked aside, landing neatly a good eleven meters away. The sniper's bullet passed through empty air this time, furrowing deep into the stones, throwing up dust and chips as the report followed. Her HUD calculated the bullet's approximate trajectory and she boosted into a run for a nearby set of flats, laughing in delight. 

She launched over a ridiculous border of crenellations, ricocheted off a gargoyle and wove between a hail of slowed bullets. She shot them aside with leisurely ease, pleased that it was Amélie, rather than Cap, who had shot at her. Even with time doing her bidding, she saw her opponent's amber eyes attempting to track her target in a steady arc. 

Though her gear was primarily designed in shades of violet, Amélie was all gold and black in the high contrast morning light. The tawny beige of her skin became part of the sun where she faced its rays, shadows dropping to olive brown, coloring that attested to the mixed heritage common throughout southern Europe. Her black hair was twisted into a sensible knot, but Tracer knew from experience that it would fall like silk straight past the woman's very fine arse. Maybe she could bat the hair loose again this time. 

The accelerator released its hold on time and she landed in a full tilt, tracing a path of pulse strikes along the aging, concrete roof that urged Amélie to flee. She giggled as the woman took her cue and Tracer took chase as they played their near aerial game of deadly tag. She drew a line of shots ahead of Amélie as they passed a series of aircon units, forcing the woman to turn, and ignored the scolding warning her HUD issued, until it changed to _Violating Objective Parameters._

Panic had her firing more aggressively, frustration replacing it when she heard a sharp cry of pain, but she needed to catch Amélie. Her outline was yellow — she wasn't an objective — but she knew it in her gut that it was crucial to catch her. Accelerating toward the muffled groan, she snatched the woman under he arms and recalled with her to avoid exiting the objective arena. 

Amélie had lost her weapon and fell to the roof, gasping and shaking from the shock of teleportation. A dark streak across her left boot marked the tagging pulse round, but the leg didn't move as if injured. Perhaps it had been undone. 

Tracer stared at the mark, unsettled, and whined softly in dismay. Crouching, she laid her fingers against the wound to check if it was still there. 

Quick as a cobra, Amélie spun up and punched Lena in the temple with the armored knuckles of her combat gloves. "I watch you murder like an animal and you wish to play games?" she roared as Lena skidded on her back. 

She made no effort to prevent Amélie from bodily pinning her, but stopped her hand with a gasp when Amélie made to use a vambrace as a handle. 

Squeezing the woman's wrist tightly, she grinned. "Careful, luv, those are mighty sharp." 

Amélie gave the thick, bulky holster edge an irritated glare, until her eyes narrowed on the thin strip of glowing red. "Hard light?" 

"It'll cut through you like butter, and we wouldn't want that." Tracer hummed, wriggling her sides between Amélie's thighs. "Wouldn't want you missing any bits at all." 

"What do you want?" Amélie asked in clipped tones, allowing Tracer to have her hands free but frowning at where they wound up. "Besides to fuck me like a dog." 

Tracer giggled. "Someone's in a snit today — such foul language. And here I thought you liked me." Taking advantage of Amélie's leery response to the dim red blades built into her new vambraces, she ran her palms up the woman's thighs and sides. 

Amélie's fear apparently drew the line at having her breasts fondled because she slapped away Tracer's hands with a curse. 

With a snarl, Tracer grabbed the offending hand, using it to twist Amélie down so that she landed with that arm pinned between them. She wound her hand into Amélie's hair, twisting it around her fist until she saw the woman wince and go still. 

She nipped at her chin, humming with satisfaction when Amélie didn't attempt to pull away. "We both know you're not going anywhere until I let you, sweetheart. Yeah yeah, I know," she continued, talking to herself more than Amélie, "you're not my luv, or pet, or sweetheart, or anything else, but I'll call you what I like." She licked the corner of Amélie's lips. "And I'll kiss you if I like." 

Tracer didn't much care that Amélie went stiff as a board or didn't kiss back, but only shoved her down a bit and hooked a leg over hers to keep her still. Without quite realizing it, her grip on the woman's wrist loosened, slid around and her fingers began to tap on the thinner material of the jersey. For whatever reason — and she didn't care about that either — Amélie became quiescent and stopped resisting so pointedly. Tracer sighed happily when she almost kissed back. It had been a while since she touched someone who wasn't trying to hurt her. 

Amélie jerked free gracelessly falling back onto her him as she twisted loose of Tracer's leg. She wiped the back of her arm across her mouth, but there was some sort of fascination or curiosity mixed with the fury in her eyes. "What did that mean?" she demanded. 

"It means I wanna fuck you like a dog," Tracer drawled. 

Hissing with displeasure, Amélie flashed her teeth briefly before spitting off to the side. "You revolt me." 

"Now, see, that was plain rude and unnecessary." With a flash, Tracer slammed Amélie into the nearest aircon unit, frowning at her resulting yelp as her head bounced off the metal. "Don't run, Amé," she crooned. "I don't like hurting you." 

"Odd," Amélie bit out, "you seem to enjoy it from my perspective." 

"Hm," Tracer responded, straddling the woman's knee and angling closer. 

"No," she said firmly. "I do not consent to this. Stop." 

Whining in disappointment, Tracer straightened, peering into her eyes. "Such a pretty color," she said with a sigh, "but it's time you closed them." 

To her credit, Amélie tried to break the stranglehold, but she was hampered by those deadly bands of hard-light. Unable to get a firm grip on Tracer's wrists, she settled on glaring until her eyes rolled back, shutting as her head lolled. 

Counting the seconds after Amélie went limp, Tracer released the pressure on Amélie's carotid arteries, the loose, cartilage ridges of her trachea springing back up under her palm. When the woman began to slide off to the side of the atmosphere control unit, Tracer caught her weight, controlling the fall until Amélie was curled on her side. Her ribcage expanded in a wheezing breath but the pulse at her throat fluttered irregularly. For exactly seven seconds, she admired the way the dawn light turned the planes of her face on that side golden, how her lashes threw feathered shadows under the violet glow of her hard light visor. 

She hunched over Amélie's unconscious form, tilting her head to listen to the communication unit mounted over the woman's left ear. Rogue operatives or not, the Overwatch agents always checked on each other while deployed. 

"Lacroix, do you copy?" A pause, and Morrison's tinny voice came through more anxiously as he urged, "Lacroix? C'mon, babe, don't do this to me. Let me hear you breathing." 

Her hackles went up, possessive rage flaring up to displace her former indifference to Morrison, and she pulled her lips back in a snarl. How dare that old man speak that way to Amélie? 

"You listening, hot shot?" Morrison asked, his tone tight with anger. "Because if you are and you've hurt her — really hurt her — I will put you in traction. We may not be able to kill you safely, but it's only a matter of time before Winston figures something out. You might have been a brilliant pilot, but you're no foot soldier. You don't have the skills on the ground to–" 

She snarled, everything in her peripheral vision fading into unimportance as she jogged to the nearest parapet. Morrison might have been the best years ago and even that was debatable. He was old and slow now, the accelerated healing that preventing him from aging gone, along with the Geneva Watchpoint. He was down there, mocking her and...and... 

Slowing at the lip of the building, she wove uneasily. He was...taunting her. She blinked hard, shaking her head as if it would clear the muzziness, pausing to swallow back spittle. It was difficult to think and she whined again in frustration. 

He shouted from below, calling out to her. 

Morrison was baiting her. That was it. Tracer grinned in preemptive triumph, because she could remember. That was new, being able to frame her mission within a past and future. Her grin faltered as she remembered snatches of a shared past, a stiff-laced but honest commander saluting her in a hangar. 

Reyes had been over Morrison, back when she joined Overwatch, and he should have been promoted ahead of his subordinate. A junior officer like herself might be promoted over a slightly more senior on the basis of merit, but not among the upper ranks. But Reyes had challenged his political superiors over their increasingly suspect assassination orders, their demands that he terminate ostensibly treasonous Overwatch agents, using his unique abilities as the Reaper. He had seen through their machinations and the ones paying the brass had reminded him of his place, promoting his own subordinate over him in harsh, tacit reprimand. 

And Morrison had been oblivious to the stunning cut of their actions, preening in front of the cameras, America's golden boy leading the charge of the righteous. He had been, according to those that served on the ground, an excellent field tactician. But in his ego, he assumed his promotion indicated a superior sense of strategy as well. 

If Morrison had such an excellent sense of strategy, he would have recognized the cabal's actions for what they were: promoting a subordinate past his level of competence. He would have seen the writing on the wall — that Overwatch had outlived its usefulness. He would have noticed the numerous information leaks and suspected their ranks had been infiltrated by warring political factions. He would have appointed officers who kept better track of duty rosters to avoid sabotaging, enemy agents. He wouldn't have allowed an emotional grudge to blind him to Reyes' machinations. 

She had gone back and watched the ghostly form of an unidentified ground technician remove a single o-ring from the Slipstream's starboard thruster. A single part that created a fuel burn imbalance, that introduced turbulence, that interrupted her craft's absolutely crucial steady acceleration. 

Morrison failed them all, and then he deserted instead of returning to face formal hearing. He acted without orders, acted without intelligence or proper support. A soldier remained with their unit. A soldier was loyal. How dare he call himself a soldier? And how dare he think he could fool her into believing that Amélie would ever accept someone so inferior as a lover? 

Tracer shifted indecisively, gaze on Amélie sprawled in the sun one moment, and the timer of her HUD the next. Her heart was strong, but there were limits to how much dope it could endure. The doctor said they would give her less, if she obeyed. It was a trap, but she had secondary orders. 

She snaked back along the perimeter of the roof until she could drop onto a lower building, using controlled boosts to silence her footsteps. It would be her increasingly hoarse panting that would reveal her presence, but for now, the steady gurgle of water in the fountain shielded her. Tracer began flanking the man in blue and white, with his red visor, where he had his back to a lorry and his gun pointed expectantly at the building she had departed. Keeping her pistols trained on Morrison, she took one measured step after another, until sunlight flashed off the muzzle of his blaster and she saw a photograph. 

No, it wasn't a photograph; it was a memory of the future, a keystone. Now. It was now. She knew what happened next from the waking dreams — what was meant to happen — and what she could change.

Tracer stopped breathing until her chest squeezed, her lungs forced in air with a deafening rasp, and she launched forward. Pigeons around a fountain in the square scattered as she cut through the cooing flock and Morrison whirled around to level his blaster at her. 

She boosted enough that everything around her slowed, allowing her to gauge the vectors of his shots, to weave easily between them. Morrison's lips parted in slow motion as his arms gradually rocked back from his weapon's recoil and she imagined his eyes went wide behind his visor. She would rip it off and check, but first... 

Sighting past him, she used her HUD to scan for hard-light objects. One, two, three of them, small orbs arranged in formation where Morrison had expected her to approach. She would have run straight into the field they projected and landed in what he and his friends believed to be a safe place. Angela was waiting there and they would try and disable the chronal anchor's kill switch. It wouldn't work. 

Her own body at full speed, she set pulse bursts heading toward each orb, then boosted to full speed. She slammed the handguard of one pistol square into his visor, hearing the carbon composite and crystal optics crack, the wet crunch of underlying bone. Laughing, she released the slipstream and bounded back to hammer the side of his head, boxing his ear right through his blatant hearing aids. A savage forearm strike sliced into his cheek, splitting skin and flesh with a sizzle, exposing the lurid white of bone and teeth. 

Before he could scream, Tracer boosted herself into a spinning kick that connected between his shoulder blades. By itself, it wouldn't have done much, but the orbs exploded almost simultaneously, as she blinked aside. 

He hit the riveted sides of the lorry hard enough to dent the cheap steel, marring an advertisement for a local grocery chain, grunting as the thick rim of the bed jammed into his ribs. His blaster clattered to the cobblestones, bouncing and skidding under the vehicle. 

"They sabotaged it in final check," she snarled at him, blinking to his side. "Can you hear me old man?" She slapped the side of his face loosely, only enough to jostle his head as he braced awkwardly against the lorry's enormous cargo hold. "But you didn't notice, did you? Too bloody busy preening and sulking every time you saw Gabe." 

He coughed, moaned as he grabbed his crushed side, patted gingerly at his maimed face, then laughed weakly. "You sorry, little bastard," he wheezed. "Too stoned to think straight. Don't know what Amé sees in you." 

"Did you think I'd fall for it twice?" she shouted. "You're not her type." 

He chuckled weakly, pausing to take several breaths. "And murdering scum like you?"

Amélie's type? Gérard sprung to mind, older than Amélie but strong, a man who projected false ineptitude and easy charm. He had been well-groomed, well-spoken, cunningly perceptive...and had possessed an odiously wicked sense of humor.

The corners of Tracer's mouth curled up into a grin as she recalled a moment in a far distant hangar, watching Morrison's eyes flicker into a wary squint. He thought he was stalling her, but she was waiting for the same thing he was.

Lena Oxton stood under the wing of the Slipstream X1, the test craft that emulated the final product, tucked her helmet under one arm and ran a hand through her hair to settle it back. Hearing a man's chuckle break through the general clamor of ground crew bustling around, she glanced over to spot the Lacroix's, apparently having a well-timed, idle stroll to observe Overwatch's star pilot return from a test flight.

Gérard ducked his head to murmur something in his wife's ear when she made no attempt to shift her gaze off Lena, and earned an elbow in his ribs for whatever ribald suggestion he made. But Amélie's shoulders shook with laughter as she swatted away her husband, who circled her playfully out of reach.

Lena had been about to dismiss their domestic banter, shuffle off the uncertain flirtation, when Gérard spun on his heel and dramatically blew a kiss toward her.

Amélie shouted at him in french, her chastising words belied by a wide grin and the briefest, sheepish glance at Lena.

"Well," Tracer answered Morrison, "killing doesn't count when it's for the government and Amé loved a good sense of humor." She tapped the back of his closest knee with her toe, silently urging him down. "You fail on both those points."

"Havin' the law on your side doesn't make you less crazy, kid," he wheezed. "Heard what she called you up there — nasty, little bitch. Something like that, right?"

She gasped when she felt the knife slide between the more flexible, abbreviated armor of her stomach. Before it could hurt, she recalled, then sprung back to knee him savagely in the groin. He wasn't permitted to speak about her...to her. Not anymore. 

Recalling a second time, Tracer dashed around the fountain and safely behind the aging concrete before her pulse bomb exploded. She grinned, hearing the lorry squeal as it tipped, the heavy crash that sent the pigeons who had taken shelter along window ledges back into flight. He would be...She cocked her head. Sometimes he noticed her pasting the bomb to his back after he doubled over. 

Ducking back out from cover, she trotted over to the rising cloud of smoke and hissing electronics to confirm her kill. There were bits of wet pink, scraps of blue, and chunks of white scattered in a neat radius. Her eyes fell on a section of curved bone, tufts of graying hair on one side, gelatinous mouse gray streaked with red on the other. She toed a nearby chunk of charred flesh before scanning the open plaza for more hostiles, but every moving form was outlined in red. 

The time on her HUD permitted thirteen more minutes before she was obligated to report back to her handler and she looked back up at the building from which Morrison had expected her to leap. Was Amélie conscious again? 

A flash of black caused her to whirl into a defensive stance, raising both pistols, but it was a crow, soon followed by another. The first turned sideways, bobbing its head side to side as it studied her in return, before letting out a caw to summon its fellows. She grunted in response because they were outlined in red too, flicked up her pistols and started to jog away from the fountain. 

Her HUD highlighted something in yellow as her foot connected with a hard and invisible object, which gave her less than a second for dismay. She had missed one. 

The explosion threw her back into the fountain, the impact against her rear fairing reverberating through her chest as flesh and bone pulled against her anchor. As always, it kept her ribcage from collapsing, but she was gasping as she struggled out of the debris littered water. There was a flash of green in her HUD before she fell clumsily over the lip, rolling behind the fountain and blinking aside in time to avoid a missile strike. 

It was far too late to recall away the injury, and might land her back on Morrison's mine regardless, so she blinked two more times away from the minefield. She made it back on her feet in time to dodge D.Va's front cannons as the shells threw up a line of shattered cobblestones, and her head and back stopped aching as her implants did their magic. Things were probably broken but it didn't matter. 

Boosting toward the green-outlined target in a zigzag pattern, Tracer snapped the pistols back into her hands and aimed at Song's cockpit. Given time, concentrated pulse fire would bore through the alloy shell and weaken a hard light forcefield, but she only hoped to temporarily blind the pilot. The M.E.K.A. was nothing but a bastion unit with human eyes. 

But she remembered her last encounter with the Korean soldier. She remembered being her age and piloting a deadly, high-speed craft, of death and fire. Her youth was irrelevant and Tracer maxed out her accelerator's speed keeping ahead of the cannon fire until she was close enough to pounce. 

Bounding off her prostheses, she watched the M.E.K.A.'s arms pivot together a hair too slow before Tracer's feet hit the top of the cockpit. The pilot had her tank bucking and spinning in an attempt to throw off the human opponent her craft was not designed to fight, but Tracer jammed her hard-light augmented feet straight through the alloy shell. Tacking her final pulse bomb to the vehicle, she allowed Song to throw her, spinning herself to land on her feet. 

"Been nice knowin' ya!" she crowed. 

The M.E.K.A. dropped into the mechanical equivalent of a fetal position as the pulse bomb went off, brilliant white flashing out Tracer's HUD. Yet when it cleared, D.Va was rising up and a cannon shell caught Tracer square in the chest. 

She regained consciousness by coughing up bloody phlegm, trying to raise herself from the cobblestones and orient. Her ears were ringing and, oddly, there was no pain. The flickering HUD informed her that she had traveled over a hundred meters and fumbling hand identified the hard object behind her as a tipped auto. Shaking violently, she looked back around to see D.Va approaching at a confident walk. 

Tracer tried to recall, to blink, but the accelerator didn't respond. Though her pistols had automatically holstered, one vambrace was partially crushed around its weapon and she couldn't control the fine muscles of the other arm enough to trigger the release on the second gun. She stared blearily at the closing M.E.K.A., her thoughts slow and stupid, before crawling toward the nearest corner of the auto. 

Something felt wrong, a dragging pull at her stomach and she reached up reflexively to pull loose whatever bit of detritus had caught on her accelerator. Instead, she gagged when that something seemed to yank inside her, retching up more blood. She studied the dark mess on the asphalt before daring a look between her arms and shaking harder. Trying to swallow back blood and bile, she picked up her entrails and pitched back to sit against the undercarriage of the auto. 

Right about then, the pain broke through the best her implants could combat. She couldn't hold back the steady stream of whimpers, the groans as she wrapped an arm around her middle, trying to alleviate the growing pain in her gut. Lena leaned heavily against the uneven metal and craned her head to see if the accelerator harness was back online yet. 

The red emblem flickered a couple of times but cast no warm glow around her. She was still too deaf to hear the telltale hum of its initial boot and she didn't have the energy to check how close Song was. It hardly mattered. She coughed again and, this time, saw the dark spray of blood as the contraction of her diaphragm triggered a burst of agony that left her seeing spots.

Taking a shallow breath, with a concerted effort, she stammered, "Tracer...to drop ship. Extract." After another moan, she forced herself to repeat, "Need extrac...extra..."

The car abruptly shuddered before D.Va lifted and threw the entire vehicle aside.

Lena fell on her back, head striking the pavement, unaware of what had to be additional pain. Was Casales ignoring the plea for assistance? Was her harness anchor about to become a bomb? Was it going to be this time? But surely not for a single target. Surely Reaper would want her to destroy multiple opponents or an entire base. There was a...a forty...forty-something chance.

Battered, one leg moving with jerky impairment, the smoking M.E.K.A. towered over her, casting a long shadow against the sunrise. "I fought giants and you thought a tiny little bomb could stop me?"

Lena watched one of the front canons spins as if Song meant to fire. At such close range, the high calibre ordinance would mangle her body beyond repair. It would all come to a blessed end, though she had hoped so much it wouldn't be in the center of such a large city. She turned her head to the side, spitting out more frothy blood. Her odds of dying now were roughly forty-one percent, discounting choice-sequence deviations.

The M.E.K.A. ghosted from view as Lena's world became an endless void of pale blue and all the pain vanished. She opened her nonexistent eyes to the slipstream with a mixture of relief and resignation. The ordeal would not end today but, if that were the case, she did not want to return to a wreck of a body.

Focusing as she had taught herself, Lena pushed backward into her own timeline, feeling as if she were swimming to molasses because another force was pulling on her like a super-powered magnet. She could only fight it for so long before the Recall Chamber locked fully on her anchor and returned her to material reality. So she clawed her way back into time far further than a programmed recall permitted before the chamber ripped her from the slipstream.

She didn't need to feign distress as her body hit the alloy floor and echoes of pain left her crying. Though her respiration was no longer labored, her gut ached in memory and her mouth tasted of blood, causing her to dry heave. Rolling onto her back so that the harness wouldn't gouge into her side, she pressed her fingers along the fibrous, reinforced material that covered her stomach. It was all intact, no wet slithering between her hands, no stench of burnt flesh. But she remembered the injuries — her body remembered the ghastly wounds, so many times now.

The pneumatic seal of the chamber door hissed, followed by booted feet making double-time. They hauled her up onto a gurney, her weight causing it to sink in the air briefly before the hover unit compensated.

Lena giggled weakly, head lolling to the side to avoid choking on foamy spittle. Emergency Transport Gurney #1, home sweet home. After the jostle that meant she was up on a surgical bed, she was held up by her arms and she felt the gut-wrenching, taffy-pull on her chest as the damaged accelerator was forced to separate from her anchor mounts. Fresh memories left her gagging, struggling against the arms holding her in place.

With a burst of spots in her vision, her body went weak and she could offer no more resistance as they laid her down. She listened to the familiar bustle of movement around her, offering no resistance as she was stripped of armor, poked, prodded, hooked up to machines that nattered on to each other and was otherwise examined. After the pressure in her chest eased and she was breathing on her own, she cracked open her eyes against the glare of the overheads.

Azarkeyvan made a sound of satisfaction over whatever readouts he could see, presented by the compact holo-display mounted over his right eye. "Vitals stable, Tetra dissipated, all reflexes normal," he began to list absently, before his voice dropped into an incomprehensible mumble as he recorded data on a holoscreen.

"Objectives?" he asked casually, making brief eye contact with her.

"Complete, sir," Lena relayed woodenly, remembering bits of Jack splattered on the bricks.

He hummed. "Sit up. Broz, Casales."

Her muscles trembled as she cautiously propped herself up, step by step. Rationale said that she had swum back through the slipstream enough to reverse the worst of her injuries. Experience told her that the doctor had pumped her body full of 'bots that would repair any injury they found, so that there were no scars on the outside of her body except for those acquired during childhood. Giving in to screaming instinct, she flicked her gaze down long enough to confirm that her stomach was intact.

Azarkeyvan leaned against a counter, pensively watching the bay doors.

Lena studied the mangled heap of armor and weaponry on a cart pushed back in a corner, out of the way, before allowing her mind to drift. Black mist flooding under the bay doors flitted through her peripheral vision and she turned her head to watch as Reaper materialized in the medical lab.

He glanced at her once before holding out his hand between the two handlers.

Casales gingerly placed the data crystal into the massive, clawed glove.

"Report," Reaper demanded in a deep, grating pitch, voice laden with promised retribution if she had failed.

"Primary and one optional secondary objectives achieved, minimal collateral damage. Morrison and Lacroix were on site, as intelligence provided, but Song was present as backup. Neither my armament or assigned deployment were sufficient to withstand her counterattack. She ambushed me with overwhelming force and I was severely wounded beyond my recall limit. Lacroix escaped, but Morrison terminated, sir."

Reaper let out a sound that might have been a gasp or muffled growl, one she recognized as rare satisfaction. In truth, he usually seemed impatient with her, as if he were dealing with a raw recruit that perpetually scraped by, rather than disgusted or unhappy. As good a commander as Reyes had been, Reaper had to know that coercion would never yield prime results.

"How terminated?" he challenged suspiciously.

"Complete destruction of the central nervous system," she answered in a monotone, then clarified. "He was in pieces, sir." 

"While I'm quite pleased to hear good ol' Jacky is done, I'm trying to decide how I feel about you toying with Lacroix, " he said idly, tapping a clawed glove finger on the gurney, beside her leg. "We both know you did, and that you probably had more than one opportunity to kill her in the process."

She couldn't prevent the involuntary twitch away from his hand, her eyes on the shimmering, red, hard-light cladding her legs. Though her prostheses didn't transmit pain, part of her brain expected it, prepared for it, feared it. Reaper would know once he watched the mission footage that Amélie had served as a diversion, allowing Morrison to set a pincer trap. It would have worked too, if she had been operating under a full dose of dope. She would have given into a jealous rage and launched herself straight into D.Va's trap.

She remembered more than she wanted about her deployment, as a consequence of the promised lower dosage: matted fur tickling her legs; an old soldier reminding her what politicians did with used pawns; an omnic hunched on the ground; pigeons swirling around a fountain; the way blood misted in a perfect arc around a small crater; Amélie's eyes bright with shock, doubt...hope; Song's eyes hard with concentrated fury; and a beautiful sunrise.

She was increasingly conscious of Reaper's extended regard, but he already knew that the dope left her subject to irrational impulses. It made her wonder why the HUD hadn't simply coded Amélie green rather than pester her about field boundaries. Someone had made a choice not to program the woman as a target, just as Morrison had chosen to become one. Lena closed her eyes, mentally chiding herself. No, he had been outlined in green.

Reaper grunted in satisfied dismissal. Sweeping forward, he flattened his palm over her anchor and pushed her back down onto the gurney. She had time to stiffen under the heavy hand that seemed to cover half her chest before he said, "I'll need to confirm your report, of course, but good job."

Her body tried to lurch as her mind was swamped with involuntary and unwanted pleasure. She heard her heels scrape against the cheap mattress, her own desperate mewl, and wrapped both hands around his wrist. As soon as he released her, she curled onto her side and dry-heaved, not caring if he took it as a sign of disrespect or source of amusement.

Reaper snorted.

Lena watched her hands shake violently, tasting bile in the back of her throat. She swallowed it back, focusing on the bitter burn while forcing her hands into fists as her breath continued to stutter with each inhalation. She couldn't prevent her hands from going slack or how her eyelids dropped, drowsiness masking acid rage.

A flicker of motion beyond her fists drew her attention to Broz, who was watching the doors as Reaper departed. The woman's lips were parted and the visible portion of her face was slack. Lena assumed that it was her first time witnessing Reaper pull his vapor trick, but then Broz turned to look at her with the same expression.

Lena bared her teeth and Broz quit gawping, but an oppressive silence filled the room until the doctor swallowed thickly. When she felt his hand on her shoulder, she schooled her expression and rolled onto her back.

"I'm sorry," Azarkeyvan offered quietly.

Lena blinked, her mind going blank. "What?"

"I'm sorry," he repeated. "I would have redirected his attention if I'd known his intention."

Sliding her eyes away from the ceiling tiles, Lena regarded him with cynical suspicion. "You really think I'm gonna fall for good cop, bad cop?" She let out a huff of derision. "I might be daffy when I'm doped, but I get what's going on here."

The doctor took a deep breath, her jaw working as he didn't quite meet her gaze. His brows were drawn as he looked toward the door. She even heard his teeth grind, but it was the pale-knuckled fist he rested on the monitor pillar beside the gurney that caused her to reconsider his apology.

Azarkeyvan wiped a hand over his face, whirling away from the gurney, pacing several steps as if lost, before snarling something that must have been a curse in his native language. He said several more words before visibly calming himself and turning back to her.

"What's got you so chuffed?" she asked in growing curiosity, despite the warning note from her conscience. "The whole lots gon' be doing the same to me soon enough." Her lips felt stiff as she added, "Might as well get used to it now."

The doctor smiled tightly before briefly examining the readouts displayed in his eyepiece. "On the contrary, any of your handlers who use that command in such a manner will face disciplinary action. The whole point of a reward is that it's something desirable and," he thumped an index finger on the thin arm of the eyepiece, "doesn't send your cortisone levels through the roof."

Her entire face tightened as she tried to suppress the resurgence of rage but she failed this time. "You're loonier'n me if you think I'll ever want this," she spat out, shaking. "I don't want this and I don't want...don't want..." She was unable to complete the sentence and jerked her eyes away from his face, clenching her hands around the edges of the thin, foam mattress.

"Tracer," he began gently, "you have three options for managing the side effects of the chronic and acute physiological arousal triggered by frequent administration of Tetra. One: I can keep you so sedated that you can't function unless you're in combat, which would result in physical deterioration. Two: a woman dies, an inefficient solution that fails to address to full range of imbalance, and our project manager is getting sick of the financial and legal expense. Three: I trigger a crafted neurochemical combination that, as a side-effect, results in a great deal of pleasure for you."

He leaned over the gurney until he hovered in her peripheral vision and asked with firm patience, "One, or three?"

She squeezed her eyes shut when they burned but couldn't stop the tears oozing free. Even knowing the choice was an illusion — that the doctor had already made what he considered to be the pragmatic decision — Her chest was shaking when she whispered, "Three."

He let out a long breath before speaking in an even softer tone, "I am aware how you perceive it, but it's not what you think. There are several drugs, new and old, that stimulate the same area of the brain, but they do so imperfectly and with numerous side-effects. Direct neural stimulation allows me to reduce your dependency on several medications that have deleterious effects in the long run. I know you don't believe it, but I truly do have your best interests in mind."

Her fingers dug so hard into the mattress that the foam split. Too furious to speak, she bared her teeth, hearing spittle between every breath. She knew it was coming right before her vision swam and both anger and anxiety bled away, under a blanket of the aforementioned medication. Her hands went slack as her respiration slowed.

"Easy," he murmured, his fingers tapping on the monitor. "There you go. You did well today. I'm proud of you."

"Shove off and stop trying to sound like my father," she slurred. "Why do you that? Y'think it'll make me forget that you signed on to experiment on humans?"

"Hmph," he responded, and she thought that would be the end of it, until he said, "I had two children, dead from a drone strike. My country wound up with yet another puppet government after the chaos of the Crisis — doubtless one of the three usual suspects. We had advanced so far technologically and I graduated from one of the best medical universities, but then my entire society was forced back decades by manufactured terrorists and foreign powers."

He swiped his palm over the monitor, shutting it down. "Talon was the only organization standing against them, so when they offered me a job in cybernetics research, I took it. I never expected this," he claimed, emphasizing that word, "but...what is that phrase your people have? Something about a penny?"

She ignored him. Though he hadn't given the order, Lena sat up, holding tightly to the sides of the gurney to avoid swaying. "You know it's the same arseholes in charge of both, right?"

Azarkeyvan went still, then his chin dropped. He was silent for a time before saying, without looking at her, "Perhaps." As if he hadn't made the implicit admission, his demeanor shifted as he waved a hand in dismissal. "Broz, Casales, take care of her."

Casales, the handler who had overseen her deployment, motioned faintly with his hand that Lena should precede them out of the medical ward. Though the man was hardly larger or taller than her, he was quick, precise and unflappable. None of her usual strategies had given him pause or resulted in personal information, but that hadn't prevented Lena from learning all that she needed.

She kept a wary ear open as they escorted her back to her quarters, but there were no vile compliments or pleasant threats. When Broz held her wrist in front of the door lock so that the scanner would read her handler ID, Lena gauged where the woman's eyes were behind her visor.

"Don't," Casales warned her quietly.

Lena pulled her gaze away from Broz, stepping through the doorway into her quarters when prompted. When they didn't immediately slide shut behind her, she circled to face the handlers, backing further into the room.

Broz took a breath and Lena cringed in dread, eyes dropping to the floor and braced. When nothing happened, she looked up to find Broz regarding her with thin lipped fury. She was about to sneer back at the handler when Casales spoke.

"If you will not give the order–"

"The doctor can speak with me," Broz said, cutting off his critique. "Good soldiers should not be punished. She did good?"

Balking for a moment, Casales grudgingly admitted, "From what I saw, but the commander hasn't reviewed the footage yet. Not to mention Lacroix. I am certain that our good soldier deviated from mission parameters once the woman showed up — she always does."

Broz shrugged one shoulder. "But a success. I say that commander has done this task for us. I will not repeat it," she reiterated. Before Casales could do more than frown in disapproval, Broz spoke to Lena. "You have earned reward as promised. When you want, say: request privacy, and you have one hour. Understand?"

Lena tried to wet her lips, but her mouth was dry. "Understood."

She doubted it would be true privacy. Active monitors for sound and visual might be temporarily disabled, but surely passive systems would remain online. At the very least, security would ensure that her bio-signatures and identity chip were present in her quarters. Despite those limitations, her heart sped at the luxury of more than ten minutes without invasion.

"Wash, dress," Broz ordered. "Then we come and take you to eat."

"Got it," Lena acknowledged.

It was in the shower that she leaned against the ceramic wall, shuddering in grief and holding an arm against her stomach. She had never known Morrison that well. He had been a senior officer and more concerned with field operations than administrative work — perhaps even a case of an officer being promoted past competence, in that regard. While he occasionally swung by Winston's engineering laboratory, Lena had merely been a junior officer within Overwatch.

Reyes had appeared in the laboratory more often than his superior, a habit Lena had attributed to him being an ever-curious intelligence officer. She hadn't been privy to the relationship between the two men but a single moment between them had stuck in mind like bug guts on a windscreen.

Reyes had been making chit-chat with Winston, asking about technical details as the scientist calibrated inputs on Lena's flight harness, forcing her to hold still. Unable to face them, she spotted Morrison breeze through the door with his usual, easy grace, charming grin already in place. Until he spotted Reyes and his face transformed into a flat, impassive glower. He had left without saying a word and Lena would have thought Reyes didn't notice, except one corner of his lips curled into a faint smirk when he met Lena's questioning eyes.

Hindsight was, as they said, twenty-twenty.

Lena grabbed for the shampoo, knowing she had seven minutes left before a handler came into the bathroom after her.

She was leaning back in the sofa chair, watching artificial clouds drift lazily across a sunny sky when Broz and Casales returned. Either it was late afternoon wherever this Talon compound was located, or the doctor needed her to believe it was to facilitate an upcoming time-zone transfer. She rubbed her thumb against her thigh, where she had been shot earlier in the day, feeling nothing except the nap of ripstop fabric and muscle, waiting for the handlers to set down her meal.

When she didn't hear the tray settle on the plastic of her desk, she glanced over with the immediate suspicion that food was being withheld as some form of punishment. The doctor normally wouldn't permit that while she was healing, and she didn't recall straying enough to warrant reprimand at all, but it also wouldn't surprise her. Instead, Broz stood watching her, holding the tray braced over an arm.

"What?" Lena asked flatly.

Broz had her head tilted back slightly as if she were studying the holo-ceiling. "The commander says you did well. He was more pleased by Morrison's termination than, I think, the minister's."

Lena grunted. "Color me unsurprised."

Casales shifted his weight, looking at Broz as if he wanted to say something but keeping his peace.

"He was your commander, yes?" Broz continued.

"On paper," Lena confirmed, focusing a bit more on the handler, well aware that the woman was fishing for something. If it was an emotional response, she was at least ten minutes too late. "But I answered to Doctor Winston."

Broz made a noise of acknowledgment. "Would you like to eat outside?"

"I'm not allowed outside," Lena said, curling her fingers to press her knuckles against her outer thigh, watching a new cloud creep into view along the corner of the ceiling.

"Mmgh, I know this," Broz admitted, coming further into the room as if it would force Lena to look back at her. "This place has greenhouse. Would you like to eat there? For thirty minutes?"

Snapping her gaze around, Lena peered at the handler, pressing her lips flat in reprove. Broz had her head cocked as she waited for an answer, though Casales gave a sharp, disgusted shake of his head at his comrade. He didn't argue, which suggested that the two had already held a debate on the matter, and he had lost. That was odd, given that as the newest member of the team, Broz ought to be lowest in the pecking order. Had she won over Trevor enough to get bumped up the informal chain of command?

"Thirty minutes from now, or in there?" Lena asked warily, tamping down a rush of excitement. She had never been one to stay inside day after interminable day. UV sessions and artificial environments were a weak substitute for a formerly social, active life.

Smiling briefly, Broz said, "In the greenhouse. There is some walk."

True enough, Lena was sure they must have crossed the entire compound before they reached a set of massive utility doors. Warm air escaped in a humid wave when they opened and Lena sucked in her breath at the contrast between both the facility's aircon and Bern. Her initial impression of the greenhouse was a riot of vegetation, but she quickly made out tightly spaced, rows of fruits, vegetables and leafy greens as she was escorted inside. When the handler's drew to a halt in a center aisle, Lena checked their expressions. Broz was occupied, of course, but Casales had his hands dangling loosely, and neither looked tense.

"Here?" she asked, making a tiny bit of a disappointment, but she could understand why they wouldn't place her too close to the enormous glass panels that permitted a wall of sunlight to flood one side of the greenhouse.

"Pick spot," Broz prompted.

Lena raised her eyebrows. "Even by the windows?"

Broz raised a shoulder in a light shrug. "They are thick and there is forcefield. I would not bring you here if you could go."

"Right," Lena murmured, making her way toward the sunny side. She could see a trampled foot path and overgrown grass before everything blurred through a dense forcefield. The geometric shape in the distance was probably another set of buildings, but there was nothing identifiable. She looked away before the handlers decided it was best not to provide her with unnecessary data.

Once the handler had backed away at least two meters, Lena fetched the tray Broz had set on the floor and settled against the sun-warmed glass to examine her meal. It was some variety of stir fry over thick rice noodles. The sauce lacked any heat but hunger from extreme exertion and rapid healing made the food taste better. She savored the time more than the noodles, blocking out the two people hovering to either side to enjoy the plants and haze of almost blinding light. Her shadow slung far against the floor and she decided that her ceiling was probably in sync with local time.

Putting aside the tray, she pulled up one leg and rested her hands over her belly. For a split second, the fullness felt like a pull and her diaphragm jumped, but she took a deep breath and held it. The injury was gone, she reminded herself, and it was hardly the first time she had suffered serious maiming. Swallowing, she pressed the back of her head against the glass, counting down the remaining minutes.


	4. Chapter 4

Lena shifted off the glass, her skin growing clammy in the heat and humidity of the greenhouse. She thought about how chummy Broz seemed with Trevor and set her tray on the floor, out of the way. Both handlers snapped their heads around to track the soft clatter, watching her narrowly, but Lena leaned back, hands curled loosely in her lap. She counted the seconds until both handlers eased again. 

Casales' comm unit beeped, breaking the stillness of the greenhouse.

"Time," he announced perfunctorily, stepping around to face Lena expectantly. 

She idly calculated the distance as she set her palm on the floor as if to push herself up. Instead, she shoved off that hand to snake out one leg, hooking the man neatly behind an ankle. A quick spin of her hips sent him to the ground before she propelled him closer to her. A shock clenched the muscles of her chest but her heart was already beating madly with exhilaration and Lena lunged forward to grab Casales by the back of his neck.

She slung him head first into the thick, pulse-proof glass of the greenhouse, hearing the tell-tale crack of bone. For a single breath, she was dismayed over misjudging the torque her new legs could generate, but it was gone by the time he slid to the floor. Then her chest seized again and she choked out a ragged cry, before something hard cracked into her own skull.

She stumbled and fell with a startled whimper, hearing the crackle of electricity whip past her ear, then a shock of paralyzing pain as the baton jabbed her shoulder. Rolling to lay against the glass beside Casales, she clutched the side of her head.

"Mother fucking bitch," she bit out, pausing to gasp between words. Her vision blurred as her eyes watered before she groaned.

"Why would you do this?" Broz demanded in heavily accented English, pointing her live baton at Casales. "You have killed him, and why? Has he done something to you? Did he?" she corrected.

Lena winced at the woman's volume as her head began to throb. She twisted her hand in her hair to combat the pain, to provide a different source of irritation, as if she might squeeze it out between her fingers.

"Answer," Broz commanded.

Letting out an aggrieved breath between her lips, Lena stared at the woman's visor, gauging where her eyes would be. "Every one of you took this job, knowing what it was. That's reason enough," she said, rather than the truth. __

Broz snorted. "Does his death change your life? You are still here and tomorrow or day after, there will be another in that uniform. Perhaps worse than him." She smiled thinly, the lines around her mouth deep enough to suggest middle age. "Perhaps like Fuhrmann or Higgins, yes?"

Lena drew up one knee, then the other, bracing her elbow as she continued to cradle her head. A nasty goose egg was forming and her shoulder ached where muscles had cramped. "Probably." She shrugged the uninjured shoulder. "Makes no difference these days."

Oddly, Broz was quiet for a moment, before she motioned around the greenhouse with her baton. "You do not want to come here again?"

"No." Lena felt the sun's warmth permeate her back and let her eyes drop to the long shadow her body cast over the floor and rich vegetation around them. True, seductive kindness was far worse than Azarkeyvan's concept of incidental reward.

"No?"

"There's nothing I want," she confirmed, closing her eyes, digging her fingers into her scalp, massaging it. But a rustle of fabric and soft clinks of metal accoutrements had her looking back in Broz's direction.

The handler had crouched down, her baton collapsed back on her belt, hands dangling loosely over her knees. "I think you lie."

The corner of Lena's mouth twitched, perhaps enough to be a weak smirk. "Does what I do or don't want suddenly matter around here?"

Lena wrinkled her nose, stomach churning over the tell-tale stink of blood, urine and feces. Glancing down to her left, she spotted the widening pool creeping around the tray and shuffled further away from the corpse.

"Then next time," Broz began while standing briskly, "I will say the second word. Up."

"Fantastic," she murmured, before clambering up, keeping her eyes strained on the broad leaves of some bright orange flowering plant taller than her. 

The headache was easing as the leftover nano-bots that had healed her previous injuries began to work on the contusion. She needed to squint against the light flooding their half of the greenhouse, but it was worth the effort of memorizing a too brief respite. Nevertheless, she looked forward to escaping the oppressive heat and humidity. 

It wasn't much longer before the greenhouse doors slid apart to reveal Alberda and Higgins, a hovering gurney trailing in the air behind them as they marched to the scene.

Before the team supervisor could say a word, Broz stepped forward. "I take responsibility. This was my decision." She motioned toward Lena. "Tracer was obedient, very calm. We did nothing to provoke her. She gave no sign, no warning, but struck him down with one blow." She finished with a sigh, her jaw working as her chin dropped in chagrin.

"Un-fucking believable," Alberda said in disgust, shaking her head at Lena. "No gratitude. As for you, Broz, the first mistake is always forgiven, so long as you come out of it with your life." She studied the corpse against the glass, lips pressed in a thin line that almost creased her golden skin. "Tracer! At attention."

Lena stiffened into an upright and squared posture, fixing her gaze on an imaginary point in front of her.

Alberda spoke to Broz, who had also come to attention. "It sounds like she took him from a stand-still?"

"Yes," Broz confirmed. "Tracer was seated against the windows. She seemed to doze and Casales was to one side and I to the other. We were talking. Then..." Broz shook her head jerkily. "She moved so fast, on the floor. She spun on her hands — I did not see how — and locked Casales by his legs. I think he shocked her — I heard her cry out — but she threw him head first into the glass. I hit her on the head, then her shoulder, but I was too late."

"Then he was too close." Alberda flicked up her visor to look Lena in the eyes.

She reckoned the glare was meant to intimidate, but Lena was curiously tired, and she allowed her head to cock, defying the order to remain at attention. This was an old battle of wills between the two of them.

"You know, he leaves behind three children. Eight, six and an infant," Alberda said, her tone laced with resignation.

Lena raised a dismissive shoulder. "His husband, and wife will get the pension." She curled her lip. "You all get hazard pay for this shite job. And an 'untimely death' bonus for your families," she added with derision, before subsiding. There was no point in reminding the supervisor that Lena herself wasn't on payroll at all; she was funded by project allotment.

With a bracing breath, Alberda closed her eyes for a second. "Mary and Joseph, give me patience. You know we are all in this together, all of us worthless to them," she began heatedly, pointing at the ceiling to indicate the lily white upper management.

Except for Reaper, his frightening power forcing his nominal superiors to tolerate rubbing shoulders with a gay latino in a melodramatic owl mask. Lena sighed back at the supervisor, knowing what came next.

"Jobs like this are the only way many of us can support our families once Talon comes to our country. We are not your enemies! Does it make you feel better to kill us instead of the ones you hate?" Alberda smiled grimly, careful not to name names.

"As much as it does to nix their targets," Lena replied glibly.

Looking past her to Casales, Alberda started shaking her head again. "We're in the same boat," she enunciated pointedly, as if she might impress that judgment into Lena's mind.

Lena bit down on a smirk that desperately wanted to become a sneer. "No respect intended, ma'am, but when your shift ends, you go home to your family and live your own life. My shift started over two years ago and when they're done using me, I'm packed into an underground cell with a fake environment, like a prize zoo critter. That _is not_ the same." Her upper lip finally peeled back. "You're free to work here or not, but my final reward is execution."

"That's enough," Alberda warned her firmly.

Lena slid her gaze back to the orange flower. Very few personnel were privileged to know about the chronal trigger — certainly not handlers who might be incidentally condemned with her.

"There," Alberda said, waving a hand at Lena, turning to Broz. "This is what you're dealing with. Do you know the most important thing?"

Broz pressed her lips flat before guessing, "That she has become mentally unbalanced through doping? That she is...unpredictable?"

Alberda laughed softly. "Oh, no, she's quite logical. Higgins here already knows, but the most important fact is that our pet psychopath is a brilliant tactician." She gradually paced in a wide arc, staying well out of reach. "She was the best damn pilot in her country — one of the best in the world — but she survived combat during the final years because she out-thought her opponents at mach two. Here on the ground, she literally fights beyond light speed."

Lena almost commiserated with Higgin's clear boredom with the newest iteration of Alberda's standard warning to new handlers who screwed the pooch. But he had an actuator and enjoyed crowding her almost as much as Fuhrmann, so he could suck it up. 

"Overwatch used her for PR because she was friendly, charming and so earnestly honorable that young fools were suckered into signing up and signing checks. She will act like your friend, memorizing your every word and behavior, until you make a complacent, predictable mistake." Alberda paused to point at the corpse. "The first time you fall for that cheerful grin or puppy dog eyes, she'll murder you." 

Pivoting around, she asked, "Isn't that right, Tracer?"

Lena faked a smile, but she took no true satisfaction in eliminating handlers, whether to rid herself of overly observant ones, or inconvenience the funding department. Every replacement required a new contract, fresh benefits and training, as well as payout to the deceased's family. If the wallet was the only place she could strike, then she would take it, but she had begun choosing her targets on the basis of potential futures.

She had been morbidly certain the first time she manipulated upcoming events on the smallest scale that time itself would lash back, attempting to reassert its original path. But nothing happened except that what she had seen originally moved further away and new possibilities emerged. 

"Answer," Alberda warned in a soft, low voice.

"Sure thing, guv," Lena replied cheerfully, before winking at Broz.

Too experienced to react to the provocation, Alberda studied the junior handler, before speaking again. "I'm supervisor because I'm the only one who has survived. I have written twenty-five termination reports — twenty-six, now — and I don't want yours to be the next. I don't know how well they trained you before throwing you to the wolves with the rest of us 'inferior stock', but I wouldn't be surprised if they sent you in blind."

Lena rolled her sore shoulder.

Alberda canted her head just enough to throw a warning look, tapping her left hand against her thigh with implication.

"The rules we have on this team are for your protection, including the ones aimed at her comfort. As you know, doping leaves the subject twitchy and anxious. If you ask the doctor, he can explain all about," and her voice shifted to imitate his speech pattern, "chronic dysregulation of the parasympathetic nervous system, but I'm no medic. What I know is that both scared and trained dogs bite."

Though she was facing straight ahead again with a modicum of professional attention, Lena noticed Broz turning her head to study her.

"To that end," Alberda continued her lecture, "treat your baton as a last resort. Train yourself to tap the shock command in reflex. Keep your distance whenever possible and use every tool in that actuator before you ever try and go hand-to-hand with her. Shock her, gag her, keep at it until she's out cold." She gave a wry twist of her lips. "If you hesitate, you give her enough time to get scared, which can trigger her combat setting and nothing but putting her into arrest will stop her then."

"Respectfully, ma'am, I was instructed to avoid such deterrents if she was recovering from injuries?"

Alberda's lips flattened, but her gaze held no condemnation. "When possible, yes, but she has implants that will automatically put her on life support. Broz," she continued softly, "whoever implied that it was...more forgivable to get in baton range was trying to get you killed, probably to win a bet."

Though they were enemies by circumstance, Lena couldn't maintain her facade of malicious humor as Broz's shoulders stiffened in comprehension. No one deserved to be used as a game piece for another's entertainment. 

Alberda motioned to their small group. "We're all too brown, too different, the wrong religion...The list goes on. Never forget that the brass hold us in contempt. Your only protection is your common sense and the officer beside you." She looked between Higgins and Broz. "Never forget it and you might survive this job."

"I understand , ma'am," Broz said firmly. "I will ensure that I do not make these mistakes again."

Alberda nodded, but it seemed absent-minded, as if she were responding to some thoughts of her own rather than her subordinate's words. "Higgins," she motioned with her chin to the tall black man hovering behind her, "take care of Casales. Get the body back to medical. Maybe the doctor can revive him. And you," she continued, her tone gaining an undercurrent of rage, pointing at Lena again, "time out."

Lena watched as Alberda folded the fingers of her left hand against the actuator in a familiar pattern, as her gamble finally paid off.

Before she could wipe thoughts of Casales from her mind, she saw his family, perhaps the one from this primary timeline, perhaps an alternate. His husband cradled an infant as his wife chased a young girl, shouting it appeared, gesturing angrily with a free hand. An older boy craned around to laugh at the scene, a VR headset pushed up as he paused his video game.

Lena shook away the images, though her thoughts lingered on the notion of family. She had one in most realities, even many of those that involved Talon. In some cases, they were even the same people — which she found simultaneously fascinating and repugnant — but those Tracers all seemed content. Meanwhile, the ones like her, trapped in solitary lives, all railed and struggled. A Tracer half a step over had been chipped, becoming little more than a hyper intelligent guard dog. Several more had charged into suicidal battle, making no attempts to evade certain death, despite knowing the possible outcomes for all the same reasons Lena did. 

Reality was a flexible beast and there might be ways out beyond losing her mind or life. Lena had work to do here with her growing hive mind, but...maybe for a few minutes she would permit herself to reach through the proverbial bars.

She aimed herself at _13927-15_ cluster, intending to watch for a bit. It was always a curious sensation to visit this set of realities because Tracer's home felt like a muffled recall chamber. Lena knew that sensation of being hooked out of temporal quicksand, but rather than the firm, unyielding grip of Azarkeyvan's chamber, this alternate felt like a nail snagged on her trousers. Though the recall was an echo in comparison, it helped guide her to it like a dog whistle.

One moment, she was drifting through a ghostly mechanical repair shop full of heavy machinery and countless motorcycle parts. The next, she was someone else, releasing her sense of self in trained reflex and slipping harmlessly into gestalt. She glimpsed memories of frightened hostages, puffed up gunmen, the police and a deferential detective, government buildings and a fully equipped armory, satisfied exhaustion tinged with regret, anticipation over seeing her wife. She prepared herself for the initial crushing sensation of too much matter in the same place as the recall field increased in magnitude to compensate.

Lena stumbled into a far more corporeal, brightly lit repair shop, an impression of hard concrete under her feet. The view around her reformed in muted colors with only a slight haze of immateriality. She took a breath, shuddering at all her regained physical stimuli as she a small circle to assess her situation. While she could manifest herself in physical reality for brief periods without assistance from anchoring technology, it took enormous will and concentration, and this version wasn't attuned to her exact frequency.

Panicked gasps behind a work bench drew her attention and, sure enough, this reality's Tracer was on her hands and knees, shaking like a leaf. It would be prudent to avoid touching her, for more than one reason.

"Well," Lena announced herself airily, "I know that wasn't pleasant but give it a mo' and the nausea will pass. Gets easier with practice, too." But before she could investigate, a woman's voice rang out from the far end of the room.

"I've no idea who you are, but get away from her _right now_!"

The woman had brilliant red hair, tied back and under a kerchief, wore a heavy, stained apron, and held an enormous spanner like a club. Though Lena reared back from the woman's fury, one corner of her lips pulled into a rueful smile. This was one of the temperamental versions. She probably ran her Tracer ragged and she hoped her other self understood how lucky she was.

Lena grinned and gave a little wave as she dodged the first strike. "Hiya, Em!"

Without honoring the greeting, an impotently furious Emily Arrington drew back her spanner for a second go. It wasn't the most sensible response, but Lena kept smiling at the woman, indulging in the near full color view. She imagined having someone in her life that would protect her with such dedication and her smile withered as she sidestepped several more swipes.

To her credit, Emily made very solid swings but the spanner looked heavy and it slowed her down. Beyond that, Lena endured a regular hand-to-hand regime to ensure she could fight even if her accelerator went into standby due to overuse. She ducked and wove around benches, stands, horses and a welding unit until Emily winded herself.

"Is this a bloody joke?" Emily demanded in outrage, as if she encountered doppelgängers of her wife on the regular. "What have you done to her? What is this? Where...where did you _come_ from?"

Lena waited to see if Emily intended to pursue further but it seemed the woman needed a breather. "Lena Oxton, from the slipstream, on short vacay. Nice set-up you got here! I mean, it always is, but sometimes equipment is in different places and the cars vary."

"Em, back off so I can shoot her," Tracer ordered from behind them.

Raising her arms in placation, Lena pivoted enough so that she could keep both other women in line of sight. "Hiya, me!"

Tracer was disheveled, her accelerator harness hastily thrown back over her jacket, its straps in disarray. Her forearms were bare, lean muscles corded with tension as she held her pistols on Lena. Her throat worked as she swallowed hard, and with her goggles pushed up, her eyes were wide with terror.

"So, I'm you from a different reality and-"

"I know who I am, _thanks_ ," Tracer bit out. "I felt you show up — felt you in my head. What I want to know is: why are you still here; how did you do..." She gestured to herself with a wave of her pistol. " _That_ , and what is going on?"

Lena sighed melodramatically and began to recite, "Because your dear wife turned your home into a giant recall chamber; practice; and pure indulgence." She scratched at the side of her head where her hair was almost bristly from a recent trim. "You're also scared because you know I'm a Talon version and think I'm going to hurt Emily, but you're wrong. Also, your accelerator needs a recharge and you shouldn't waste it threatening me."

She hadn't thought Tracer's eyes could get wider, but they did and she wondered if her own did that too. Well, they were almost the same person, so probably. Then she heard the tell-tale blow of a plasma torch and dropped expediently to the ground, laughing.

Craning her head straight back, she looked up at Emily and gave her a wink. "Sometimes you try and get me with the angle grinder, instead."

Though Tracer kept her pistols trained on Lena, she didn't shoot.

"She's Talon!" Emily protested, waving at Lena's shoulder patch. "What are you waiting for?"

"I know!" Tracer shouted back in obvious frustrating. "I bloody well know, okay? But we can't just– I don't know what'll happen."

Breathing hard, Emily aborted her next attempt at bodily harm, finally doing as asked. "Fine. Marvelous. _Hell_. Do we have a plan? Should I ring Winston?"

Coming to a decision, Tracer lowered her pistols, though she didn't put them aside. She chewed on her upper lip, studying her counterpart with obvious unease. "She's unarmed and..." Her eyes dropped to Lena's unlit anchor.

"And?"

"And I should keep my rig out of her reach. If the emitters work for her, then so will this." Tracer paced uneasily in a small arc, raking a hand through comparatively longer hair that fell over her eyes, accidentally shoving her goggles off entirely.

Lena flinched at the plastic clatter, tracking the sudden motion in nervous reflex, then gave a huff of aggravation. She could no longer remember a time when she hadn't lived with constant anxiety. "It wouldn't do me any good," she offered, gauging the likelihood that her answer would be accepted, this time.

Emily and Tracer simultaneously gave her the same, incredulous glare.

"What?" Lena protested. "I'm on a different frequency, or wave-length, wotnot. I'm no physicist, but your Winston could explain. Even if I nicked your kit, it wouldn't last; it'd give out trying to hold me." 

She wondered if this reality's Winston would attempt to rescue her as he had his own Tracer. Would the slipstream even allow it? Were they different enough on an atomic level? Would additional matter and energy fit into an existing reality? Or would they simply...merge? 

"How do you know that?" Emily asked warily.

"Tried it once."

Tracer narrowed her eyes. "Do we want to know how that went down?"

Lena dropped her gaze to the concrete, rubbing a knuckled under her nose, but didn't answer. It had been the first and only time she had ever killed herself. The physical shock of mirrored experience had been gut-churning, and perhaps Emily's grief moreso.

It wasn't that Lena knew the woman. She had missed the opportunity to meet her own version of Emily by almost two years. Talk of imminent budget cuts, and rumbles of dissent within the U.N., had driven the Slipstream project into overdrive, but Overwatch had held out longer in her reality and its time of war. Lena, Winston and his team had all worked a grueling schedule to make that test flight happen before the axe fell, in the hopes a major success would forestall the security council. 

Emily had beendishonorably discharged after her covert relationship with an omnic laborer came to light, while Lena was flying combat missions in Australia. While it hadn't been illegal, every omnic was considered suspect during the unofficial wartime state, but a.s far as Lena knew, the two were doing well despite the racial tensions within the United Kingdom. Though the Emily in her reality was a stranger, every emotion one of Lena's counterparts had was wholly tangible when they merged in the slipstream, and she had experimented in this branch enough times that certain memories might as well be her own.

"I only came to visit for a bit before I go back to work," she said evasively. "If you want me to kneel here the whole time, that's fine."

Emily released the suspended plasma torch and it zipped back along its ceiling track to the default location over a large jack-stand and set of horses. Setting a hand on her hip, she declared, "I'll get Winston on the phone. Let him know some other version of you just showed up out of nowhere, because apparently these things happen."

"Right," Tracer agreed absently, setting down one pistol within easy reach and allowing the other to dangle. As soon as Emily was across the garage, she asked, "You one who believed the shite Talon fed you about your friends abandoning you? Or one they took?"

"Took," Lena answered simply.

"Straight from, or after?"

She meant the slipstream and Lena said, "From. Claimed they were still Blackwatch, but I sorted the facts once they started letting me loose." With a desultory shrug, she added, "Turned out my Winston nearly had his prototypes up and running when the UN pulled the plug, but almost only counts with horseshoes and hand-grenades, so here I am."

"Yeah, about that..." Tracer prompted, with a reproving frown.

Lena bit her lower lip, unable to conceal a sheepish grin. "Guilty as charged. But, in my defense, it's all I can get." Her weak smile twisted as she recalled exactly what Azarkeyvan gave her in substitution.

Tracer grimaced in distaste but the expression melted into poorly disguised pity. Motioning with her hand, she said, "You can get up. I caught enough I believe you."

"Huh," Lena noted noncommittally, relaxing back onto her heels after standing, fully conscious of her counterpart's thinly veiled condemnation. 

She needed to remember that she was still partially phased into the slipstream, which meant Tracer might subconsciously catch suspicious thoughts and emotions. Most of the Tracers noticed very little within the slipstream because Winston's version of the accelerator operated on a tighter frequency band, whereas Talon had little concern for their subject's peace of mind. The heroic versions traveled through in controlled bursts, guided by computer algorithms rather than self-will. Lena wasn't afforded the luxury of such blinders, which meant her own intentions would slip through far more easily than the reverse.

Tracer glanced back at her in curiosity, head cocking to one side as if she heard something. A troubled tightening of her brows later, she glanced away. 

Shrugging lackadaisically, Lena asked casually, "Only wondering how much you remember. Most of your lot don't see much."

"I saw enough when I was lost."

"Oh? You wake up sweating from bad dreams you can't quite remember? Walk past that Thai place you love but it's a kebab shop now? Ask everyone when it switched out but they say it's been there the past ten years? I'll bet you thought it was your own life, a bunch of maybe's that you could have done, but we're all real. And every time you nip through the stream, you're one of us. So no matter how good your Winston is, it's so, so easy to misstep into your neighbor's back yard."

Tracer's eyes had narrowed as Lena taunted her and she pressed her lips into a thin line before speaking. "You can quit your attempt to psyche me out. I know there are others, you ruddy wanker." She jerked her chin up with a snort of contempt. "I write down all the memories I know aren't mine, keep 'em sorted."

Lena hunched forward, grinning as if she were about to share a secret, checking over her shoulder that Emily was still, courteously giving them privacy. "You know that kebab place down on Milner?"

"Get to it," Tracer said, with dismissive impatience.

"It is a Thai place a half step over in _13927-15.028-04_ ," she sotto whispered, rattling off the serial number.

Tracer's left eye ticced before she worked her jaw, scoffing at the claim. "Nice try."

Lena tsked. "You not even gonna ask what that number means?"

Tracer gave a terse shake of her head before looking toward Emily. "Obviously a designation. I use a system too."

Following her gaze, Lena put aside her goal long enough to admire the woman in all her filthy, mussed glory.

Despite her own solitary life, she had found that numerous Tracer's who worked for Talon had long-term lovers. It was usually Amélie or Emily — sometimes both —, though the former occasionally brought Gerard along. Other former team members cropped up the further she fanned out in reality. In most cases, those individuals were equally enslaved, whether voluntarily or not, but sometimes they were employees conducting clandestine affairs, a member of Overwatch or brave civilian. One time, the entire team had defected in favor of supporting Blackwatch's Talon Initiative. The warmongering cabal within the security council had been fully exposed in that reality, allowing Overwatch to flourish as a world humanitarian organization.

Meanwhile, this Tracer had graduated from the RAF during peacetime and gone straight into testing and development. She hadn't been forced to compromise on her passions until handicapped by the slipstream, when Blackwatch made their bid too early. 

"Ever been one of me?" Lena asked, changing tack. She wanted her counterpart in a temper but not suspicious and talking about oneself would seem conceited, _forgettable._

Averting her gaze, Tracer bumped her pistol against her thigh as if listening to a silent beat.

"What's wrong?" Lena taunted. "Don't like thinking about the worst you can be?" She slid her hands into her trouser pockets, taking an experimental step forward. "Ever talk about it with her?" she asked, gesturing with her chin toward where Emily was engaged in hushed conversation. "She's a feisty version. They're not usually this aggressive, mate, but I hope you appreciate what you got."

"I do, and I'll protect it with my life," Tracer warned mildly, pointedly ignoring the previous questions. But her eyes were distant.

Lena snorted. "I know." Cautiously, she moved to the side to admire the work shop. "You have a nice place, nice home. Nice family," she added, agitatedly yanking her hands loose to slide her fingers along a set of tools on a nearby bench, resisting the urge to fling them to the floor at the injustice of it all. "And I'm in time out — won't be here too long."

Emily strode back over to them, her tread quiet despite her heavy boots. "Winston says the array should be collecting data by default, but he'll come up here soon as he can manage."

With a soft noise of negation, Tracer shook her head. "I'll call the office, make a few arrangements, but I doubt she'll be here for much longer. Just...keep an eye out," she added, tapping an index finger against her temple. "She's not right."

Keeping her back to them long enough to school her expression, Lena swallowed back a sharp burst of pain, surprised at herself for even caring about her counterpart's opinion. "I'm not going to hurt either of you; I already explained."

"Maybe, maybe not, but we both know you're not one of the good guys," Tracer answered. "Mind standing somewhere that isn't next to a bunch of sharp tools and blunt implements, luv?"

Lena clenched the hand neither of them could see into a fist, hard enough to pop her knuckles, before forcing the fingers to unfold. She stepped back from the bench. "Not like I had a real choice about any of it. It was either them or eternity and," she looked back at Tracer, lips pulling back in a sneer, "don't act like you woulda done different in my place." She transferred her gaze to Emily, who was observing the interplay with fascination, "Because she wouldn't have. Not a single one in my place said no. I would've felt them floating around in the stream."

It was either that, or the slipstream swallowed up and devoured a consciousness that floated for too long. 

Rather than challenge the assertion, Emily looked at Tracer in question.

The other woman went suspiciously silent, avoiding her wife's gaze and fidgeting for a few seconds before breaking under the silent inquest. She began to speak haltingly. "Remember how I told you I saw the different versions of my life, different times, choices I could've made but didn't? Things that couldn't have happened but did anyway?"

Emily made a noise of agreement, this being a familiar topic, giving a truncated nod at Tracer to continue.

With a deep breath, Tracer admitted, "I wasn't a very nice person in some of them. Sometimes because it was easier and I wanted to be and sometimes," she raised her eyes to Lena's, "because I didn't have a real choice." She drifted toward Emily, then shied away. "I'm sorry I never told you but..."

"But it wasn't you. I don't care what a version of you might have done. I care about you — and you came home, remember? That's what matters to me." Emily crooked a smile, catching Tracer by a shoulder as she tried to veer off again. "You remember certain things — I understand that, but _you_ never did them and I refuse to believe you ever would."

Emily's eyes fixed on Lena's shoulder patch. "Not you," she affirmed.

Turning her back to the increasingly domestic scene, Lena gritted her teeth and wrapped her hands together back atop the forbidden bench. There were times when she could catch Emily alone in the shop or apartment, but this reality had a limited window between the installation of the field emitters and Winston correcting his oversight. Before and after, Lena was reduced to watching from afar as with almost every other timeline. She would twist this encounter into her own memory once she was forced back into Azarkeyvan's recall chamber. Even a constructed relationship was better than an empty cell disguised as a normal flat.

"Stop trying to borrow my tools, damnit!" Emily snapped in exasperation.

Lena reflexively obeyed the tone of command before she realized. She hunched her shoulders, bearing the familiar burst of shame, and reminded herself that the conditioned obedience was keeping her alive. With a deep breath, she straightened up and began to make a slow circuit of the garage, rather than waste her breath claiming innocence. She enjoyed picking out the minor variations in equipment and vehicles, weighing the aesthetic choices her counterpart made as if unaware that she was being closely followed.

Emily was studying Lena's legs with a peculiar sort of fascination. She drew her eyes up until they fixed on the small, protruding cylinder of Lena's anchor. "Lena..."

Lena twitched before realizing that Emily meant Tracer, who responded.

"Yeah?"

"I think...I saw her. You. This one. While you were...when you were gone." Tone becoming brisk, Emily narrowed her eyes at Lena. "Do you normally wear some kind of armor? And that thing," she gestured at the anchor, "does it glow red and turn into a T-shape?"

Lena grinned, pointing a finger-pistol at the woman. "Sharp. Either me or one like me. There's quite a few of us, aren't there?" she needled, switching her gaze briefly to Tracer with sardonic amusement. "They armor me up and stick their brand onto my anchor to cover up the slipstream blue. It's part of the accelerator harness — separate pieces in my world." She bared the tips of her teeth. "Risky to leave life-support equipment lying about, y'know."

"So, what's time out, exactly?" Emily asked abruptly, sidling between the women and giving her wife a quick warning glance. Though her manner was casual, she had the wicked spanner propped up on her shoulder.

Lena quirked an eyebrow, maintaining her smirk before answering the other woman's question. She tapped a finger lightly on her anchor. "They turn this off and chuck me in the slipstream as punishment for this'n'that. Used to scare me — doesn't anymore, but I let them believe otherwise."

"I see," Emily responded with preoccupied speculation, attention drawn to the stabilizing device. "Why?"

"What happened to not caring?" Tracer muttered before being quelled by another reproving glance from her wife.

"Forewarned is forearmed," Emily quipped back pragmatically, before adding drolly, "And if we're trying to be civil."

Lena hummed, dragging her fingers over the deeply curved fender of a beautifully restored Jaguar C-Type, one of the wheeled 2030's models. What she had mistook for pale blue proved itself a pearlescent cyan that shimmered into lavender and back under the powerful overheads. It was a shame she couldn't take it with her, but even if her anchoring field were large enough, she wouldn't be permitted a personal vehicle.

"Killed one of my handlers," she answered, assuming Emily meant the cause for time out, not the lack of fear. When she was met by silence, she pulled her eyes away from the vehicle. Emily seemed perplexed while Tracer's face was neutrally closed. "You know, like they have in zoos for wild animals?"

"I know what a handler is, thank you " Emily said, nonplussed. "You killed them...what, for kicks?"

Lena grunted. "He was a Vishkar plant, not that anyone but me knew that. Couldn't have him snooping."

"So, why not just tell your boss?" Tracer asked in protest. "Why murder him? Don't act like you didn't have a choice about it," she said with renewed condemnation, brows lowered, the pistol twisting in her hand.

Lena raised her eyebrows, cocking her head. "Sure, I had a choice. One between getting rid of a spy or letting Talon know I'm a better one. They already use me as an assassin because of that," — she pointed at Tracer's pistol — "and because of this," — she touched her anchor. "How do you think they would use me if they knew I could bop around the stream checking out every possibility?"

Comprehension lit both Tracer and Emily's faces before they met eyes and looked away.

"I made the best choice available," Lena said firmly and felt her eyes crinkle in genuine amusement. "You're both military; you know not to give away intel to your enemies — any of them."

"Funny," Tracer grumbled. "You don't seem to be following your own advice at the moment."

Lena frowned at her counterpart. "We're not enemies and you're not listening. Don't know why I bother; you never do." Shaking her head in disgusted, she pulled open the driver's side door and slid into the car. "Leather. Nice."

"Would you get out of my bloody car?" Tracer shouted, finally roused from her sulk.

Lena grunted dismissively before grinding her teeth and studying the logo crafted into the center of the steering wheel. This reality cluster held many similar versions and Lena had earned this chance. She deserved it — and it wouldn't be murder. Licking her lips, she listened and judged the time. It should be about now.

She ran her hands long the pale, beige, leather wrapping as she directed her next, mellowed words to Emily. "I'll bet you have this beast purring."

Lena could see Emily smiling fondly in her peripheral vision, though it certainly wasn't directed at her. It was a good thing her imagination worked well.

"And don't flirt with _my_ wife — _not yours_ ," Tracer growled.

"Oxton," Emily chided. "I'm not about to forget which one I'm married to. Besides, if I'm understanding this correctly, she can't leave the building. The Jag is safe." She smirked ever so slightly. "Not to mention — you there — you wouldn't get terribly far without the keys, either."

"Nope," Lena agreed, giving the word a strong pop for emphasis. She waved at the well-appointed interior. "Your precious baby is safe. Gorgeous work, by the way," she drawled at Emily

"Look, that's enough!" Tracer snapped in visible outrage. Dropping her pistol, she lunged forward, grabbing Lena by the shoulder and hauling her bodily from the car. "C'mon, you. Get out of my-"

A brilliant burst of cyan energy crackled at the point of contact, piercing the air like a lightning strike.

Lena laughed as she fell into a roll, dusting herself off as she rebounded to her feet with a small bounce. The sub-atomic overlap hadn't hurt her — and probably not Tracer — but she recognized the sensation far better than her counterpart. And, she knew how to break loose.

Tracer was bent over, clutching her own wrist, gasping for air. She raised her eyes to Emily first, seeking reassurance of her own presence in reality, then glared at Lena. "What...what the hell was that?"

"Oh," Lena began to answer, making a lazy pirouette on the point of one foot, "quantum fusion stuff. I wasn't gonna originally, but she was givin' me such guff I decided to test a hypothesis. See, I reckon we're not meant to be in the same place at the same time, unless we're the same person."

"Oh for God's sake ," Emily injected with exasperated comprehension. "Both of you two place nice, please, so we don't have some sort of sub-atomic...event. I don't want to live in a crater — or a _Doctor Who_ episode."

Keeping a neutral expression, Lena didn't correct her misconception. Dramatic light-show aside, fusing back with Tracer now would merely send Lena back into the slipstream. She took a deep breath, scenting ozone, burnt metal, oils and solvents. She listened to the background noises audible through the wide garage door, the hustle and bustle of the inner city. She needed to be here and now for everything to play out just so. 

"Please tell me I'm not this obnoxious most of the time?" Tracer pleaded in despair, retrieving her pistol from the floor and inspecting it for damage.

"I'm sure I don't know," Emily demurred cheerfully before her tone did a full one-eighty as she turned back to Lena. "Now, what were you trying to tell her before–" She abruptly pressed her lips together, clearly rephrasing, "...all that happened?"

"That the slipstream isn't the end of the world." Lena looked at Emily again, a wistful smile breaking through her hard-earned self restraint. "That's the trouble with the heroic versions of me. No practice — not that I blame 'em. It's scary out there at first." She slid her gaze to Tracer. "But you can learn to sort it if you try. There are versions of us that definitely have," she finished in low warning. "Ones a lot worse than me, who _have_ told their masters about this trick."

For a moment, all she heard was a soft ticking from some nearby water pipes and a faint hum emitting from every wall around them. Then Tracer took a shaky breath, letting it out slowly, pressing her empty hand in a loose fist against her thigh.

Lena sighed and hoped these two listened for a change. It wasn't their fault that they had everything she wanted, and she tried mentally repeating that to herself several more times. There was time to change her mind. She crossed her arms so that neither of the women would see how they shook, but when Emily accidentally brushed against her while checking on her wife, Lena inhaled sharply and reflexively leaned forward.

With a wordless sound of anger, Tracer bunched, her accelerator flaring, but before she could launch forward, Emily grabbed her arm.

"We don't have time for this right now," she said hurriedly, scanning the room as she dragged her wife a meter back from Lena. "Power down — power it down, now," she ordered with hushed urgency. "Can't you hear that? It's already straining — the emitters can't compensate like usual."

Lena chuckled when the increasingly overloaded emitter array was finally forced to cope with the program conflict between maintaining one partially synced subject versus going on standby to facilitate Tracer's use of her accelerator. She uncrossed her arms, making a decision.

The walls were humming louder.

"Yup," Lena acknowledged. "You guys did fantastic with this array, but there's two of me." She stayed exactly where she was, pocketing her hands and canting a hip in feigned relaxation. Sounds and colors were warping as she struggled to concentrate on maintaining her presence in this reality. All she needed to do was wait out her inexperienced counterpart. "I warned you not to boost."

A muffled explosion came from within one of the walls and Tracer's accelerator fizzled, going dark. She began to flicker, her colors fading in and out, and then started to shake. Looking frantically around the respectively fading garage, her gaze landed on Emily. Dropping her gun, she snatched hold of her wife's apron. It held for a second before her hand slipped

"Help, Emily, oh _fuck_. Help..." she repeated in a desperate litany, all semblance of confidence dissolving with her atoms. When she opened her mouth again, only a squeal of static emerged.

"No! Hang on — I'm not going to lose you again," Emily pleaded, her anger forgotten as she swiped at Tracer's fading body.

Another wall began to hum and the colors around Lena brightened suddenly. As if a layer of cotton had been lifted, she could hear traffic outside, smell oil, petrol, the ozone tang of past welding.

"The overload's flashing over to the other emitters!" Emily shouted in desperation, looking between them, her hands tightening into fists as Tracer grew wraith-like. She swung her gaze to Lena with vengeful fury. "Get out of our home."

"Get out of my car; get out of my house; get out of my wife; get out of my life," Lenan jeered. "Nah. I think I'll stay." 

Visibly collecting herself, Emily suppressed both her anger and panic before giving Lena her shoulder and returning her attention to Tracer. "Right. Okay, okay. We know the problem and we know there are solutions," Emily reassured the phantom. "I'll call Winston and make sure he's fired up his chamber — if he hasn't already, since he was trying to monitor things here. You'll be fine. I'll get your spare charged up and we'll get you home in a jiff." She rolled her lips inward, ducking her head for a moment. "I love you — and you _come home_ , Flight Lieutenant Oxton, you understand?"

Lena slowly made a fist as she watched Tracer nod jerkily. No one had made promises like that to her.

"Might be the last thing she hears from you," Lena predicted malevolently. "I'm better at stayin' put than she is. The stream'll yank her out before me and I'll hop over to Winston's. Can't say for certain, but I bet if the doc — my doc — fires up his chamber, she'll wind up in my place."

After another futile attempt to grab onto Tracer, Emily turned to Lena. "Please...just...please go. I can't lose her again — not like this; not if there's anything that can be done." She swallowed tightly. "Don't try to tell me you're the same — we both know that isn't true."

For a heartbeat, Lena considered ignoring her because it was obvious what was about to happen. Unlike her counterpart, she had attained stability within the slipstream. She understood how to navigate, how to center on a single timeline for extended periods, how to remain on its fringes rather than be swept into chaos. All she had to do was wait out this other Tracer and the emitters would latch onto the nearest one of them. She could use the accelerator harness to escape, then find...someone to tune it to her frequency. 

She had fantasized about escaping Talon this way countless times and she was being given the opportunity to do it, right now. Even though this version of Emily would doubtless reject her, Lena would be free of Talon. She might be able to convince this reality's version of Overwatch to accept her as a replacement for their original, especially given her superior combat skills. If nothing else, they wouldn't want to face her as a mercenary, or worse.

A second emitter blew out and Emily started to tremble, reaching between her wife and the imposter, beseeching. "Please, don't do this to us. Don't do this to her. I'm sorry for whatever's happened to you, and for what you've had to live with, but get out of our home and just go back to...Go back. Please."

Lena watched as Emily gave into tears and her stomach clenched, whether from seeing her pain or the thought of submitting to Talon, she couldn't say. Yet if she didn't go, this good, kind — if judgmental — version of herself would land in Azarkeyvan's recall chamber. It would be Lena's first few months all over again, but with more refinement and efficiency. She would have no period of grace and far fewer opportunities to resist or escape, all while mourning a lost spouse. And this Emily hadn't called Lena a monster.

Emily held her gaze, her eyes silently begging as her wife gradually lost her tenuous grip on reality.

Reluctantly, Lena admitted that this life could never be hers. "Tracer, can you hear me?"

The increasingly ghostly form turned to face her and gave a jerky nod, her hand clenched around the fairing of her accelerator harness as if it were a life raft.

Lena began to back toward the garage doors. "Listen carefully and remember: a clock reads whatever a person sets it to."

Blowing a kiss to Emily, she turned and sprinted, releasing her hold on _13927-15.028-05_ right as she would have collided with the garage doors. It felt like syrup, but she passed through them and out onto the street. She kept running until the pavement disappeared as she was yanked back into the slipstream. Reality faded to a translucent cyan and she didn't dare go back to watch. She might change her mind.

By the time she was recalled, Lena knew that the Swiss Minister hadn't obstructed Talon; they had helped push through a tariff clearly meant to dissuade Vishkar from exporting to their country. Oh, she had discovered bribes, money-laundering, corporate espionage and concealed slush funds, but her mission had ultimately been payment for services rendered. Vishkar would have a manufacturing plant in Switzerland before the year was out, courtesy of a few, loud bangs and silenced voices. 

* * *

Lena paced in her vault, exhausted by the day's events, but her mind circled and sorted through the data she had collected. Her deadly choice had opened the path to a new set of timelines, and she mentally aligned herself with finally being in _13890-32_. She had little control over what her former Overwatch comrades did, except to relay whatever information she could through Amélie, but they had a crucial vacancy to fill now.

Though Reyes had always been the superior strategic commander, Morrison had been promoted due to similar ability. Without him, the current unit only had a field tactician in Fareeha Amari. True, there was her mother Ana, but like Jack, she had abdicated authority by deserting her unit, one of the most damning crimes a senior officer could commit. Those who remembered that betrayal to the Security Council would be as reluctant to accept her authority as they had been Morrison's.

She chewed on her lip, tucking into the gap around her bed, along the wall, around the sofa chair, past the small desk where she both studied and ate, then back again.

Without his stubborn obstruction, strategic command would fall to Sangwi Hana Song. While the senior agents might be uncomfortable with her youth, she brought the Korean government, it's M.E.K.A. program and considerable financial clout with her. The reunited Overwatch desperately needed funding and the Republic of Korea needed every edge it could find against the People's Republic of China. After the omnics razed the largely defenseless North Korea, China marched into liberate the decimated country. But Talon's alliance with Vishkar created a greater threat from India and the tech giants of Korea would oppose that megacorporation on general principle.

Lena raked a hand through her hair in frustration. She had never wanted a command track because politics gave her headaches. Keeping track of a growing list of possibilities, only to discard the entire probability tree when her timeline shifted in response to her actions, left her floundering each time. But if she didn't stay ahead of her options, she would be the victim of wasted opportunities. It might not work, but sometimes all a pilot could do in a dogfight was keep changing direction.She squeezed her eyes shut as if it would contain the kaleidoscope of potential events, having memorized the path her feet took automatically.

Lena jerked to a stop when she heard the pneumatic hiss of the room's door unlocking.

Alberda stepped into her quarters, taking a position against the wall, so Lena circled to face her uneasily. 

While she had become accustomed to Trevor doing that, he was following special orders. She was normally left in peace once she was in standby. Watching the supervisor, she felt the weight of the entire day bearing down on her: the mission, the terrified minister, Song's rage, tattered bits of an old commander, Amélie's fleeting, grudging embrace, agony, sun warmed glass that reminded her of body heat, the eggshell crack of Casales' skull, and hunting in the slipstream.

Lena permitted her body to deflate with a sigh of exhaustion and began to kneel so she wouldn't fall under the repeat shocks.

"That's not why I'm here," Alberda said, jerking her chin to abort Lena's motion. "You've already been duly reprimanded." Her expression grew sour in reproach as she leaned against the dull gray wall and crossed her arms. "I won't pretend that I'm not furious, but it wouldn't be fair to blame you for being what Pirouz made you. No, I'm here following his orders."

Lena shifted her weight as anxiety flared, recalling Azarkeyvan's warning. She had assumed that would be off the table, given the need for punishment. She was never rewarded after a reprimand. But then...she remembered his full justification. He meant for this form of positive reinforcement as both stress relief and a hard neurochemical reset. With resignation, she went to the most comfortable sofa chair and tucked herself against the cushions because the thought of enduring it while lying down made her stomach clench and left a bitter taste in her mouth.

She bowed her head and waited for the words.

"I suppose you did well when it came to your own goals, but..." Alberda exhaled wearily. "Reaper was pleased with your combat performance, though disappointed that Song survived. I think he saved the footage of Morrison. Hard to tell without a face, but I think he was overjoyed by that bit." She snorted softly. "Must've been one hell of a grudge between them." 

Lena raised her eyes long enough to express her irritation over the garrulous delay, then went back to bracing, fingers digging into the pastel green suede of the sofa chair.

"Fine. I'm going to enter the command manually," Alberda responded, her high traction boot soles making little sound.

Manually? Dread coiled in Lena's stomach. At least the trigger phrase acted as a courtesy warning, but it seemed the handlers would be able to catch her unawares as they often did with the shock. Clenching her jaw, she watched the sequence Alberda tapped into her actuator carefully.

Instead of involuntary pleasure, the actuator let out a protesting, continuous series of _beeps_.

Alberda muttered a curse, glanced up at the foyer and backed into it.

Her actuator continued beeping.

With a huff of exasperation, she looked at Lena and motioned autocratically with her hand. "I need you to move further back into your quarters."

Rather than do as ordered, Lena stopped breathing until her lungs forced the matter. Was it a different trick entirely?

"Move," Alberda repeated, drawing out the single word.

Lena stood, evaluating the floor plan. Her bed was further back but she refused to use it She didn't want it to be a place where she was tormented. Nor did she want to wind up on the floor, so with a grunt of effort, she dragged the chair into the far corner and sat back down.

"Good," Alberda praised, chuckling when she saw Lena instinctively cringe. But her amusement faded quickly into a...fidget.

Cocking her head in bemusement, Lena watched as the senior handler tried to pace, to circle away, catching herself each time. She heard Alberda take a deep breath, exhale in measured control, before abruptly flipping her visor back over her eyes. When the woman began tapping the actuator again, Lena pushed herself into the chair.

"I don't feel bad off," Lena said tentatively, and it was the truth. The constant low-grade arousal and temperamental outbursts it fueled were weeks off, in her experience. 

"This will be more effective than waiting until, and I quote, you become dangerously unmanageable," Alberda countered, but her tone carried a muted apology.

Lena clenched her teeth against a futile protest, closed her eyes and prepared to endure. 

She woke in confusion to find her room dark, the ceiling portraying a starry sky with partial cloud cover, which meant it was after 2200. Between the cyan glow of her anchor and the dim red of her legs, every plane and surface in her vicinity was bathed in violet. She rolled her head carefully, easing away a kink in her neck from falling asleep sitting up. With a grimace of distaste, she pushed herself upright and headed straight for her shower.

She nearly dozed off leaning against the tiles, more relaxed than she could remember in a long time, but doing her best not to dwell on why. Her arms and legs felt like lead, as if she could sleep a thousand years...and wouldn't that be splendid?

"I should have stayed," she murmured, the words drowned out by the drum of water, certain that her scheme to escape into another reality would have worked. 

Grunting at herself in admonishment, she finished rinsing off and soon stumbled out of the bathroom. She wanted to believe she could lay down and go straight to sleep, that there would be no anxiety, no nightmares, no slightly too fast heart-rate. But her mind was already trying to cycle back through the observed time-lines, so she picked up the sedative vial that had been set on her bed stand and slid into bed. Extending her left arm, she popped the canister into her injection port, extracting it promptly and setting the empty vial back on the stand before getting comfortable. 

She watched the stars blearily and hoped that Amélie had understood the coded message.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lena torments the protagonists of [Temporal Mechanic](http://archiveofourown.org/works/9081802/chapters/20651095), used with that author's oversight.


	5. Chapter 5

Wearing a virtual reality headset, Lena gestured with her hands and fingers, guiding her imaginary aircraft in battle against alien centipedes. It was nothing like flying an actual plane but it occupied her time and created the illusion of freedom. Right now, it served a far more important purpose as she pretended that she wasn't flying just any tactical craft, but the Slipstream jet itself. The VR headset became her flight helmet and the sofa chair the cockpit until she felt sweat at her temples and under her arms. Her imaginary craft began to jerk and weave as her hands shook.

Breathing through her mouth, she began to count as a particular virtual landmark passed, ignoring the alien eggs now striking her craft, causing game alerts warning her of imminent crash and burn. She watched her screen turn red, an aggravating alarm declaring critical failure almost disguising the hiss emanating from the narrow air conditioning vents of her quarters. It might have been a relief to remove the headset, if it weren't for that.

In her peripheral vision, a black mist coagulated into a vaguely humanoid column as she pulled the hand controls off of her wrists.

She did not greet Reaper.

He picked up the headset, turning it delicately between the clawed tips of his gloves. "Gaming? Or did I interrupt a good time?"

She rolled her jaw before answering, knowing he would see the way her hands trembled, banking on misattribution, "You didn't interrupt. Your doc's buggered that for me. Thanks a bunch."

He chuckled softly before strolling to the low bureau, cocking a hip against it and facing her with crossed arms. Away from his men, and with the cameras undoubtedly disabled, he made little effort to appear fully solid. His outline wavered, his entire body a murky suggestion with little definition or detail. But then, a cloud of cybernetic nanobots posing as a human could hardly be faulted for not being one. 

"The credit goes to Trevor, Oxton. Man made a good case for increasing focus on positive reinforcement despite Pirouz's initial failures with that strategy. I noticed there were a few hiccups along the way but I hear it's been smoothed out."

Lena clamped her jaw, fixing her gaze on the plush carpet. Given that the change in their controlling tactics had come with the new recruit, it shouldn't have been a surprise that Trevor's reluctance had been at least partially feigned. It was a good reminder though that he was as much a jailor as the others, no matter how pleasant his approach. 

"You used to talk more," Reaper said in bemusement.

"So sorry," she said with an acerbic smile. "Is there something you want to chat about? Goth fashion or sommat? 'cause I reckon you came here to gloat, rub my face in it 'cause it ain't enough that I got no control over my own self."

She knew he was not here for any of that and reminded herself of the Slipstream. She needed to remember that day vividly. Looking up at Reaper, she recalled sitting in her cockpit, giving the thumbs up as a member of the ground crew made a quick, final sweep. She hadn't known it then but that member of her crew had worked for Blackwatch and was acting on orders from Commander Reyes.

Though Overwatch intended to keep the military applications of the Slipstream technology for their own use, they had agreed to share the general technology with numerous scientific agencies, a concession to the organization's funding. Most of their Intelligence wing had been strenuously against sharing that data too early, arguing that it would be weaponized by hostile governments and other entities. It had been a rare example of Gérard Lacroix and Reyes agreeing on a subject in vocal opposition 

Lena hadn't paid much attention to those debates, too occupied by a demanding schedule of training, prepping and publicity appearances. Even if she had suspected a sabotage plot, she had been a a mere R.A.F. officer on loan, no one with any authority outside her highly specialized purview.

"You could have at least some control, if you were willing to work for it. We both know that."

"Yeah, yeah," she drawled derisively. "I act like a good little soldier and do my job proper, put on a good show for the brass and I'd have better than solitary in underground bunkers." She twisted in her chair to drop her jaw onto her fist, regarding him stonily. "We been down this road and I still think you're a lot of tossers." 

How a mask could give the impression of a condescending smile, Lena didn't know, but Reaper achieved it. 

"Consistently stubborn ," he observed conversationally. "Doggedness is what made you a good pilot, patience doing the same thing, day in and day out — a real skill. But it's being a smooth talker and that capacity for sincere conviction is why Morrison wanted you for the job. Wanted someone with charisma, a pretty face on camera to freshen up their image."

"You mean just like him?" She sneered, preparing the necessary cue. "Got to you, didn't it? The better man being passed over so the All-American, blue-eyed jock could have the top seat?"

Reaper was silent for a moment before he started to shake, dissolving slightly about the edges, and then he was laughing, deep, grating guffaws until he pushed off the bureau to face her more fully. 

"The trouble with you, Oxton, is that you're book smart but you don't have any sense. Let me level with you: I never wanted to be some mealy-mouthed figurehead with no real authority the way Jack wound up. I liked my job," he growled. "I didn't like my team getting blamed for Overwatch's incompetence, not when we were getting shit done, not when we were the ones who actually got their bullshit funded. Because power comes from the same hand that feeds you." He stood. "And I would've thought you learned that by now."

She bit back a hot retort and thought about the Slipstream, thought about the way the craft had begun to shudder as warning lights illuminated. She thought about how it had felt to truly lose control when even the eject command had refused to cooperate — disabled by that Blackwatch agent. 

Lena swallowed tightly.

"Which is why I recently awarded one of the techs a bonus for noticing the morse code you were teaching yourself. I commend you on your cleverness, but that trick ends now. Interfere in your programming again and it invalidates your new doping agreement, understood?"

"Yes, sir," she bit out, while flipping through memorized timelines and isolating a branch. She curled her fingers uneasily. It could still work, though Overwatch didn't have as much information yet as she would have wished. "I'm so flattered by the praise, sir." 

He grunted. "Stop trying to antagonize me. Makin' yourself look like a damn fool."

"Maybe I'm just in a bad mood 'cause I've been stuck in here for eight days straight."

"Well, that's not entirely true," he countered with a grating chuckle.

"Oh, right, they let me out for walkies," she said in disgust, referring to her daily exercise and combat training.

"Maybe if you didn't randomly murder employees you wouldn't have that problem. As we keep telling you, a better life is in reach "

"Not bloody likely, so get on with it."

"With?"

"Whatever you're gonna do to me this time." She straightened, slapping her hand down onto the armrest . "Last time you gave me a pep talk I was prepping for the Slipstream and we both know how that turned out. Told me to 'knock 'em dead'. Didn't turn out so well for me."

Ironically, she was being honest in her ignorance. There were an array of possible actions Reaper could take at this division point, over which she had little control. It would take a room full of super computers to keep track of how every nuance resulted in different events, so she limited her manipulations to the most important ones. What happened afterward was almost inevitable in this branch of time. 

"Hm. Unfortunate how that turned out."

"For Overwatch," she murmured dryly.

Reaper's head jerked in her direction, his body fading and overlapping in place so that only the amorphous mist around his edges curled and twisted like smoke.

"I think they were counting on that project to win people over, make it out like Overwatch could be innovative and..." She gestured with her free hand, a forlorn wave of defeat. "Something else, I guess. Never know, right?"

She wished she didn't know so that the envy wouldn't gnaw so deep. 

Reaper's body relaxed back into flux and he grunted with noncommittal acknowledgment. "Sure we do. Either the Slipstream succeeded, got the public eye off an unfortunate series of disasters, and on their new poster child, or an unfortunate young soldier died. Might be that flight would have changed you no matter what the outcome and then their scientists would've been all over you," he drawled, the intimation clear.

"Until I had an unfortunate accident too?" Lena winced, the words having escaped without her intention.

He went silent again and despite his lack of eyes, she could feel his intense scrutiny. "Finally aging up enough to see what was going on, huh?" He took a deep breath, letting it out with a considering hum. "I won't say they were scraping the bottom of the barrel — you're a certified genius after all — but you have any idea how many experienced test pilots turned down their offer flat? Why they went searching for a young, gullible combat pilot, one too star struck to think hard about all those things?"

Proper test pilots trained for years in specialized modules. R&D had their own division and they both knew it. Just as she only had her youthful arrogance and foolish trust to blame. She couldn't argue any of his points without being disingenuous — they were all true.

She turned her head to stare at him flatly. "I do, actually. Knew it then too but didn't care. Maybe suspected is a better word," she allowed.

"Now..." he said slowly, planting a palm against the bureau as if he meant to push off before changing his mind to settle again. "That's interesting. Tests should have shown if you were suicidal, had PTSD from combat, and I read the originals."

Lena raised a shoulder in a disinterested shrug. "High risk threshold. So many of us died up there...It got to be normal." She closed her eyes, but it drew her attention to the massive knot in her stomach. "So what's it gonna be today?"

Reaper was tapping a single claw against the bureau, _tik tik tik_... 

"Oh, we're playing this Trevor's way for now. I gotta admit he is getting results, but I'm here because I'm trying to figure something out," Reaper continued in an ominously amicable tone. "Since we are apparently have an unusually candid discussion..." 

Lena raised her head, regarding him impassively.

"Y'know, you were a mess when we pulled you from the slipstream, but you bounced back fast to this damn annoying, stubborn idealism. And I get it. You didn't know Overwatch was gone yet and were trying to be a good little officer and escape back to your home government. But they've hung you out to to dry. Britain might be pansy-ass about most things but they still execute traitors." He rolled his shoulders in a casual shrug, "Got extradition agreements with most other countries too. If they were smart, they'd stage your execution while squirreling you away as a legally dead non-entity."

She slid her gaze away from him, lips pressing tight. "Your point?"

"There's no one who wants you back, Oxton. Unless you're dumb enough to fall for Lacroix's act. Woman's a hell of a sniper and pretty good hand-to-hand, but I don't think I ever met a snobbier bitch. That woman loved Gérard, even if he was blind as a bat when it came to the real enemies, but at least he was upper crust enough for her tastes. But some brit from the slums? Oh sure," he admitted with a wave of his hand, "they led you on, but we both know that was a lark. She's not going to forgive you-"

"I know," Lena said irritably despite her best efforts, in part because her knowledge of possible futures meant that she knew the Lacroix's hadn't been that insincere in their efforts. "Seriously, just get on with it."

Reaper chuckled softly. "Alright. My point is that Overwatch used you, treated you as a disposable asset, nothing more." He tipped his head in a brief nod. "MI6 sent two teams after you — or rather, the technological asset. Their words, not mine. But there hasn't been a move from them in over a year now. And even if they did get you, what do you think would happen?"

"Cut me to pieces in a lab, most like," she answered with affected disinterest. "Like you said, what, two times, three now?" 

"Exactly," he rumbled, ignoring the jibe, "so-"

She peeled back her lips and glowered. "You might've been some big shot psy-ops but we've done this song an' dance plenty, sir. I am well aware that if I somehow make it out of here you can fetch me right back without leaving the base and there's nothing better waiting for me. I know, alright? You can skip this part."

Breathing hard, Lena swallowed back the frustrated words that wanted to spill out in a torrent of accumulated fear and boredom. She clamped her jaw until her teeth hurt, her neck locked, timing each inhalation, fingers gouging into the fabric of the chair. It didn't matter if he saw her anger; it was what he wanted.

She glanced at the VR headset and redirected her mental energy to the Slipstream. 

"I don't get it. You understand you've been disowned on every front. But all I'm hearing is pride. And for what? You're not gonna win this fight, soldier."

She felt her eye twitch at his subtle dig, reminding her that she would never be a flying officer again if Talon had any say in the matter — just their pet super soldier. "Nope."

"Then why not start compromising?" he asked, a note of genuine curiosity in his voice. "You know why you haven't been chipped?" He pointed up with a jerk. "Because the Board values your skills and abilities, not just that." He swung the finger down to point at her anchor. "Calling you a genius wasn't flattery; it's what you are and chipping would turn you into another grunt — one with special abilities but not the best you could be." 

He slashed a hand through the air. "Who are you fighting for, Oxton?"

"Myself," she snarled. "Your precious Talon is evil. It doesn't matter that Overwatch hosed me; I had friends there." She stopped herself, taking a breath and holding it before letting it out slowly through her nose. "Which you know is more than I was born with. It's why I never take the shot, no matter how much you dose me. I can't."

"Didn't stop you with Jack, though. Did it?" he positively crooned.

Her leg started jiggling, starting back up every time she forced it still.

"Well? Never got the impression you hated him. Hell, you two had track days in your spare time, racing hotrods around like maniacs who didn't need to show up in one piece for the work the next day."

She scratched anxiously at her nape. "Yeah, was fun, but I wasn't thinking good and hard back then about who must have decided to pick a prodigy over a professional. But like I said — didn't matter. We were all dropping like flies out in the OZ anyway. Here, there, no difference "

With a long sigh, Reaper crouched, a gargoyle draped in a wafting cloak of darkness, putting them in what was meant to be eye level. "Look, I was like you once. I was a believer...and I still am, but age has a way of making you pragmatic about what can and can't be achieved. I joined up fresh out of high school to get a job, to put food on the table. When the S.E.P. came up, I jumped at the chance. Not because of the war — though that mattered too — but for the opportunities and benefits that came with it: better pay, a higher education, promotions, all of it. But do you know what I did for the good ol' U.S. of A that got me to the top of the heap?"

She flicked her gaze to the dark sockets of his mask, the glow of her anchor casting cyan light across the angles and planes, waiting.

"I was an assassin. They called me Reaper and sent me in to eliminate problem people, some good, some bad. In the end, being a killer got me promoted. You aren't the first good little soldier doing that job; you won't be the last; and there's no shame in it. It gets done one way or another so the world can be a better place for all of us. Regardless of your opinions, Talon helps a shit-ton of people. We provide infrastructure, jobs, educations and political stability. That's how you help the world — not by playing hero.

"You say we're evil, but what's evil about providing jobs, building schools, medical aid? Every government out there does black ops, just like Overwatch and most major internationals. They just call it corporate espionage. The difference is, we're transparent about our goals and methods. We don't force our troops to do our dirty work — profit off them — and deny their existence. We work with government approvals, negotiate terms on paper, all above the board."

Lena looked down at the faint red glow cast by her legs onto the floor, doing her best to let the seductive logic slide off her defenses. Reaper was most dangerous when he wasn't lying _No_ , whispered her own voice within her mind, _lies had been Morrison's specialty_.

He waited before asking, "So tell me: how are we the evil ones?"

She closed her eyes. 

He pointed a claw back up toward the ceiling. "Show upstairs that we can trust you, that you'll make an honest effort, and you'll have the best life possible. The power to change your exact method of deployment is in your hands," he emphasized almost gently. "Show them you're a cut above and there won't be so much...collateral damage. Stop acting like an animal and we'll stop treating you like one."

"I can't!" she burst out, hands clenching into fists. "It doesn't matter what you lot force me to do. They aren't my choices and I never signed on to be an assassin! If my only choice left is to go along with it or make you work for it then-"

"Except you did sign on," he rumbled, cutting her off and uncoiling his bulk to stand. "Would you really prefer that we put you in an empty room, on starvation rations, under constant sensory overload until you can't even talk in complete sentences? Are we gonna have to go back to that, Oxton? You said you're fighting for yourself? Prove it."

As hard as she tried not to, Lena began to tremble. She opened her mouth to speak and a wavering sound emerged rather than words. She closed it and swallowed thickly, desperately reminding herself that his avowals were empty promises. Two years in and he kept making it out like they could be allies, as if Blackwatch hadn't sunk its counterpart to throw in with rival political factions. No. It always came back to the Slipstream and technological leap it represented, the tantalizing prize for every government and corporation. 

"Well, you're going to have plenty of time to think about what you do and don't want because Pirouz and Trevor are working out the best way to modify your mission assignment protocol. What's it that the doc likes to ask you?" He grunted after a moment. "Ah, A or B? Is that it?"

"Yes, sir," she whispered.

Her knee stopped jittering as the crushing weight of finality settled on her. She knew how this version of time went. She knew and felt sick. 

"You can tell your answer to the doctor when you get back. Try and be smart for a change." 

* * *

Lena pulled herself together instantly, taking inventory of her location within the slipstream, reflexively pulling herself to Point Zero. The Slipstream M.1 materialized before her, floating languidly amidst the roiling waves of blue and white. Translucent smoke trailed up from one engine bank, the final result of a cascade failure that might have been traced back to a single reprogrammed relay circuit if it had ever returned to physical reality. The A.I. flight assist would have reported the source — did report it to the pilot, but far too late.

She lay her palm against the wing for a moment, then pulled, drifting above it to land lightly on its surface. She walked — because she wanted to be walking — until she could look down into the cockpit. A mental blink later and she was fitting herself into an uncomfortably familiar custom molded seat. A console alert was still warning her about the failed relay and she stared at it before sealing herself inside. She rested her hands loosely atop the stick and concentrated on flying, on the fear that came with it, allowing her mind to search.

The next instant, she felt cramped, trapped within her own body, as if she were an animal trying to claw out of a closed sack. No, she knew this sensation, remembered it and forced herself to be still. Another Tracer was in the slipstream right now, occupying this space — almost occupying. She was in a cockpit but far different from the M.1., angular with larger knobs and dials, grime worked into every nook and cranny, the dinginess of frequent use and age ground into nearby panels.

The pressure around her head and visible rim of a visor dipping low over her face indicated a helmet, and she raised her hands to feel its contours. There was a chip in one place, a set of deep scratches smoothed down by polishing in another, but a jagged gouge over one temple. It was deep enough that tiny bits of slag caught on her fingers. Cockpits were designed so that the pilot's head couldn't come in contact with anything but the seat rest, which meant something must have either penetrated the cabin or something had been tossed loose. 

When she tried to lean forward to get a better look over her shoulder, her chest jerked to an immediate stop and she twisted her head down and to the side enough to make out some sort of accelerator harness visible beneath her respirator. She shifted again, testing, deciding she was connected either to the seat or the body of the craft itself by that harness. Lena nodded absently, regarding the billowing slipstream visible at all angles outside. She was vaguely aware that her head hurt? And this Tracer wasn't providing any coherent thought or information, no struggle or resistance to her superimposed presence.

Well, that wasn't very helpful. She wriggled her gloved fingers on the craft's stick as she considered her options, aware of a growing exuberance through her chronic, choking fear. There was a button on top of the stick, but when she mashed it, she felt the alternating pneumatic pulse of front guns under her feet. Bright blue flashes of light disappeared quickly into the slipstream ahead of her.

_C'mon girl, gimmie something to work with_ , she thought, aiming the desire toward her counterpart while running through the gamut of her own accelerator's mental commands. The ship shuddered once when she concentrated on blinking, but remained in stasis.

Abruptly, there it was: a panicked grogginess accompanied by...

Lena dragged them back into reality, with a smattering of help from her counterpart, then gasped.

Most people believed space was vast empty darkness punctuated by white lights, but that was the result of atmospheric filtering. Much of it was dark to the human eye, but here within it, no planets in sight, there were bands of color that resembled clouds, hazy areas of fog that trapped light waves. And, oh, streaming flashes of some sort of pulse fire, one clipping her strange craft.

Right, Lena thought as her apparent light fighter craft tumbled weightlessly. The owner was still not conscious, and she could feel the accelerator heating up around her chest as it tried to compensate for both of them within its field of affect, but she knew how to use a stick and pedals. She banked around, making limited sense of what passed for a horizon line on the console and allowed the targeting computer to guide her to the offender. She assumed it was the one shooting red at her.

A radio startled her just as she fired, but her hands worked automatically.

"Lena! Tracer! Do you copy? Status!?"

"Uh..." she said, "I'm fine. Got knocked about is all. Be right in a mo'."

"...why are you talking like that? Nevermind. Fall back to Delta."

"Uh..." she said again, weaving and evading another funny looking opponent as her vision blurred and a panicked outrage welled up within her. "Nice meeting you," she got out.

Lena was summarily ejected back into the slipstream, into her own dead craft. She sat there, staring through the immaterial test fighter, before grousing, _You're welcome_. Unfortunately, her mind was buzzing with pleasure and excitement, not the sensations she was going for.

Focusing, she tried again. 

* * *

Lena's disorientation after her emergence from the slipstream wasn't feigned this time. It had been too long, enough that she had forgotten what a body felt like. Every raw sensation hit at once and she twisted into a fetal position, gasping. Everything was too hard and resistant, the floor too cold and hard, the dry air scraping her skin and throat. 

"Up," a familiar voice rumbled, but there were no threatening footsteps or aggressive demands followed.

When she finally stood on trembling legs, Reaper was fully formed, his shifting eyes watching her through his owl mask. "A or B?"

She squinted at the bright lab lights, swallowing to test her throat. When she tried to speak, it came out a croak. Several more attempts later, she managed to say, "A." 

He studied her for a second before grunting in acknowledgement, stalking toward the lap doors. "Get her set up." 

Two handlers stepped inside, batons out, assuming flanking positions with the knowledge that while Tracer wouldn't do anything with Reaper present, she might resist now out of sheer confusion. Rather, Lena had conditioned them to believe that was a normal response to being recalled.

She stared vacantly at them, intermittent shudders going through her body. There was too much sound and her skin prickled. She swayed, stumbled, heard batons crackle with energy as she regained her footing. 

"Can you walk?" asked Azarkeyvan through the chamber's speakers.

She gingerly set one foot forward, shifting her weight over it, swayed again but kept her balance. Another step, then another and the handlers fell in behind her. Her gaze skittered around the room, searching for a time and date display, knowing they wanted her shaky and uncertain, a weakened condition they had achieved far differently in the beginning. That would have been choice B. 

"No," Azarkeyvan ordered, as if he read her mind. "Eyes forward and follow me." 

She lowered her head and trailing along silently as they lead her to one of the doctor's laboratories, but still needed a hard nudge toward the programming chair. It was enough like a cockpit, and she thought of the Slipstream. 

"Stop dawdling," Reaper ordered, "or I will pick you up-"

With a small bounce off one leg, she vaulted into the chair, flipping onto her back and slapping her arms onto the rests with practiced coordination. She watched one of the handlers insert an IV into the injection port at the crook of her arm before the second man bumped her chin with his baton. It wasn't a rough impact, enough that it prompted her to look forward so that he could slide a helmet over the top of her head and face.

A prickling chill crawled through her body and she didn't know if it was the medication or fear. They didn't bother to lock her down because she couldn't move a single voluntary muscle. She wanted to shake, couldn't shake, but sweat was making her skin clammy by the time the lights dimmed to twilight blue. Someone was speaking but she was thinking of bright blue light, of her test craft shuddering into the silence of the slipstream, how she couldn't move, couldn't scream, couldn't eject, couldn't escape.


End file.
